


Starlight

by howelleheir



Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Abuse of the Vulcan Language, Age Difference, Angst, Bathing/Washing, Caretaking, Dubious Consent Due To Identity Issues, False Memories, Flashbacks, Head Injury, Identity Issues, Injury Recovery, M/M, May/December Relationship, Memory Alteration, Minor Spock/Nyota Uhura, Mpreg, My First Work in This Fandom, Older Man/Younger Man, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Panic Attacks, Pon Farr, Post-Star Trek: Into Darkness, Sexual Tension, Slow Burn, Supernatural Illnesses, Telepathic Bond, mostly canon compliant, xenoglossia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-08-24
Updated: 2016-12-01
Packaged: 2018-08-10 18:00:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7855336
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/howelleheir/pseuds/howelleheir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Not at all,” says the Ambassador. There’s something very odd about his tone, and Spock thinks -- with a momentary sinking feeling that he only just manages to suppress -- that he’s made the wrong decision. He should have contacted his father instead, or at least taken the Ambassador’s communication in private, where he might have been able to more easily decline. As it was, Spock had cornered the Ambassador and made a very inconvenient request with a bridge full of old friends weighing the situation against him. As if he can read the conflict in Spock’s face, he continues, more firmly, “Jim’s counterpart in my own time was more important to me than, I think, you can understand at this point in your life. If he doesn’t prefer something more private, I’d like to host him myself. To have him here while he recovers would be a most welcome reminder of that...importance.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Collision

**Author's Note:**

> So, I've fallen into the Star Trek fandom over the past month-ish and basically binge-watched TOS and all related movies. This fic is basically me jumping real hard at the parts that tickled my angst and identity kinks. My approach to this vast, sprawling canon is pretty much, "Eh...close enough," so if you're a die-hard fan of total canon compliance, this may not be the work for you.

  
“Captain!”

Jim hears the shout, then nothing.  One second, he’s standing, and the next, he’s on his hands and knees in the dirt, ears ringing over the sound of frantic phaser blasts.

Someone nearby groans, “Oh, shit. Shit...shit...shit…”

He looks around, only to realize the voice is his own. Well, that’s probably not a good sign. Staggering to his feet and into formation, he fires on the attackers, but their trailing after-images make it difficult to aim, and none of his shots hit home.

“Bones!” he shouts, his voice still oddly far-away. “Need you over here.”

Spock glances Jim’s direction, and side-steps to bring his shoulder against his back, supporting him, then gestures to Uhura and the security officers to close ranks around him. McCoy sprints over behind the cover of Spock’s phaser-fire and ducks into the circle.

“Where’d you get hit?” he asks, as he eases Jim back to the ground, crouching next to him and pulling the medical tricorder from his belt.

“Head.”

“Lean forward,” he says, checking through Jim’s hair for bleeding, then scanning his head and neck. “Did you lose consciousness?”

“I- I don’t know…” Jim slurs. “Yeah, I think. For a second.”

“Okay, looks like--”

Jim never hears the end of McCoy’s sentence, because the vertigo builds up all at once, twisting his stomach, and he pitches forward and vomits into the dirt.

Things get really fuzzy from there, until he’s crouched on the edge of the transporter platform aboard the Enterprise, leaning heavily on the hazmat bucket tucked between his knees. As soon as the vomiting slows down enough to move him, McCoy and two nurses have him in a wheelchair, eyes closed against the dizzying way the corridors rush past on the way to medbay. He thinks, _I need to get back to the bridge._

* * *

A few hours after the Captain’s injury, the situation on the ground is under control, the Enterprise on its way to Starbase 82, and, on the bridge, Spock is wrestling with indecision. A brief call to medbay would be more than sufficient to determine the Captain’s condition, and would be the best course of action considering the bridge is already short one senior officer. However, Lieutenant Sulu had proven himself a satisfactory commander on more than one occasion, and it was highly unlikely that any situation beyond the lieutenant’s capabilities would arise in the amount of time it would take Spock to personally check in on the Captain. The gesture had little practical purpose, but it would likely be appreciated nonetheless. In fact, it could prove better than calling down. If the Captain’s condition had indeed worsened, a call might distract Dr. McCoy from his duties, whereas going to medical in person would allow Spock to observe without interrupting if necessary. All things considered, going to medbay himself would be the reasonable choice.

“Lieutenant Sulu,” he says, standing decisively. “You have the conn.”

* * *

Medbay is quiet when Spock arrives. The Captain was the only one injured in the incident, aside from a few minor scrapes and bruises. Dr. McCoy is seated at his workstation, and the Captain on the edge of nearest biobed, bronze film over his eyes to dim the harsh lights.

“Spock, hey,” he says with a lopsided grin.

“Captain. I thought I might check on your condition in person.”

The Captain gives a shrug and what might be best described as a giggle. “It sucks!”

“You seem in unusually good spirits in spite of that.”

“Euphoria,” Dr. McCoy offers, turning in his chair. “Enjoy it while it lasts. After a day or so, the irritability’ll set in.”

“I take that to mean the injury was fairly severe?” Spock asks.

Pulling up one of the Captain’s scans, Dr. McCoy says, “Not as bad as it could’ve been, but look here,” he points to a small dark blotch toward the bottom of the image.

“A bleed?”

The doctor nods. “Yeah. So far, it’s stable. I’ve been doing a new set of scans every hour, and it hasn’t gotten any bigger, but that could change any time. With this type of injury, you can’t really tell how bad it is right away. I’m gonna keep him under observation for seventy-two hours, but even after that, he’ll have to be on bedrest.”

“Oh, bullshit,” the Captain pipes up. “I’ll be ready to get back to work tomorrow.”

The look on Dr. McCoy’s face seems somewhere between amusement and frustration. “Jim, I hate to break it to you, but you’re gonna be out of commission a lot longer than a day. You need cognitive rest, and you’re not going to get that staring at a bunch of screens and flashing lights all day. You know I don’t want this pointy bastard in the captain’s chair anymore than you do, but you can’t be on that bridge with this injury.”

“Although I fail to understand the need to insult me to make a point,” Spock says, “the doctor is correct. Until you are fully recovered, you cannot resume your usual activities without risk of further damage.”

The Captain laughs. “Okay, so what are you going to do? Confine me to quarters? For how long?”

“I don’t even want you on a starship,” says Dr. McCoy. “One little bout of turbulence, and you hit your head again? Do you know what secondary impact syndrome is? It could kill you.”

“Bones, you’re being paranoid--”

“He is not, Captain,” Spock cuts in. “Even a very mild second concussion before the first is healed would likely result in your death within minutes of impact. Should the ship be fired upon or encounter turbulent phenomena, the risk would be too great even if you were confined to quarters.”

“So what’s your solution, then?”

“I would suggest that you take medical leave on a Federation planet or Starbase at the earliest opportunity.”

“Perfect,” the Captain says, throwing himself back onto the biobed. Dr. McCoy cringes, but doesn’t comment. “You know, this feels _really_ goddamn familiar, Spock. You marooning me all over again...And Bones! Would you look at that, you’re sitting by and just letting him do it. Just like old times.”

“Jim,” says Spock, surprising even himself with his use of the Captain’s given name, but the familiarity of it has the distinct advantage of disarming the Captain. “Your assumption that I wish to take command of this ship from you is in error. In fact, I would prefer that you relieve me as soon as possible. That cannot happen if you are dead, or if you prolong your recovery with inadequate rest.”

The Captain seems to consider Spock’s plea, then sighs. “How long?”

“Six weeks,” Dr. McCoy says.

A grave silence lingers between them for a few moments, until the Captain nods. “Okay,” he says. “I’m assuming you have a plan for where? You’re not just going to jettison me onto the nearest frozen wasteland and hope for the best again, right?”

“That would not be very conducive to your recovery,” says Spock, alarmed.

“It’s a-- never mind. Look, I’m...really tired,” the Captain says. His speech is suddenly slower and more slurred. It was likely that the conversation had taxed his mental endurance well beyond its current capacity. “How about you just figure out a place I can take my medical leave, and I won’t put up a fight as long as you let me sleep until we get there?”

“Agreed,” Spock nods. “In fact, your comparisons to the Delta Vega incident may already have presented a solution. I know of a nearby location that I think will be suitable and willing to host you in your recovery.”

The Captain chuckles to himself, an arm draped over his eyes. “Great,” he says. “Doesn’t sound ominous at all.”

* * *

“Commander,” Nyota says from her station. “Receiving a response to your earlier communication. Should I put it on the screen, or would you like to take it in private?”

Spock takes a moment to consider. The matter at hand isn’t particularly personal, so it’s unlikely he’d be uncomfortable if Spock took his call on the bridge, isn’t it? And it’s doubtful that the crew’s inclusion in the conversation would make him feel pressured into yielding to Spock’s request. A possibility nonetheless; however, the chance seems remote enough that it doesn’t justify Spock’s leaving the bridge for a second time in two hours. “On the screen, please, Lieutenant.”

Although he’s spoken to him on several occasions now, upon seeing his own face aged more than a century, Spock always feels a brief shock, no less potent now as the Ambassador appears on the ship’s main screen.

“Ambassador,” he says as the transmission clears. “As always, I am grateful for your time.”

“My apologies for the delay in returning your communication, Commander. What can I help you with?”

Spock takes a breath before replying, “A favor, Ambassador, if you are willing to accommodate it. Captain Kirk was injured this morning on a diplomatic mission to the Tellun system. A group of political dissenters attacked the landing party, and the Captain received a blow to the head from a blunt projectile. His condition is stable, but Dr McCoy recommends that he take medical leave as soon as possible. We were to return to Starbase 82, but even if we increase speed to Warp 8--”

“The journey will take 7.6 days,” the Ambassador finishes. “But diverting to New Vulcan would take only three days, more or less, depending on your present course and location.”

“Precisely, and I wondered if you might be able to arrange lodging and medical care. The Captain’s leave will last approximately six weeks. Of course, if it is too much of an imposition--”

“Not at all,” says the Ambassador. There’s something very odd about his tone, and Spock thinks -- with a momentary sinking feeling that he only just manages to suppress -- that he’s made the wrong decision. He should have contacted his father instead, or at least taken the Ambassador’s communication in private, where he might have been able to more easily decline. As it was, Spock had cornered the Ambassador and made a very inconvenient request with a bridge full of old friends weighing the situation against him. As if he can read the conflict in Spock’s face, he continues, more firmly, “Jim’s counterpart in my own time was more important to me than, I think, you can understand at this point in your life. If he doesn’t prefer something more private, I’d like to host him myself. To have him here while he recovers would be a most welcome reminder of that...importance.”

“You have our gratitude, Ambassador,” Spock says, feeling reassured, if still a little puzzled. “Dr. McCoy will prepare the Captain’s medical files to be transferred to the specialist there. Is there anything else we can do before we arrive?”

“No,” says the Ambassador. His expression changes into something indecipherable -- his lips pressed subtly thinner, his eyes glossy -- and when he speaks again, his voice is heavy with some hidden meaning that disturbs and confounds his younger counterpart. “Commander. Thank you.”


	2. Duality

When Jim wakes up, his head is pounding and his teeth feel too sharp against his dry tongue and the second he opens his eyes, he snaps them shut again, because even the dimmed medbay lights pierce through his retinas straight into the back of his head. And then the nausea hits. It’s like the worst hangover of his life ten times over.

A short way off, he can hear tense, hushed murmuring. Focusing in on the words is almost more than he can manage, but eventually, he sorts the low buzz into two distinct voices. McCoy. And Spock.

“...don’t know a damn thing about the _human brain._ ”

“Doctor, I assure you, Vulcan medicine is well ahead of most other societies when it comes to neuroscience--”

“Which doesn’t change the fact--”

“Keep your voice _down,_ please.”

“--that their medical knowledge is based on an entirely different _species_ and I’m not just going to let some _alien_ poke around in Jim’s _head._ ”

“His medical team will be led by my mother’s personal physician. She knows human anatomy as well as you do, if not better. I think an integrative approach in this case--”

“So there’s one doctor who’ll know where all his organs are. Even if I ignore that she had _one human patient,_ there’s still the environment on that colony.”

“I fail to see how the environment--”

“Hot, dry, _low oxygen--_ ”

“All of which can be--”

“And what’s he going to eat? Diet is a factor in--”

“Doctor, if you would stop interrupting me--”

“So he’s going to be dehydrated, oxygen-deprived, and malnourished--”

“I am trying to tell you that--”

“Hey,” Jim slurs, dragging himself into a vaguely less horizontal position. “Can you guys, um. Shut up?”

Well, that wasn’t how that was supposed to come out, but it got the job done.

“Okay, what’s going on? Are we going to New Vulcan?”

McCoy throws his hands up in frustration. “Apparently.”

“As I was attempting to explain to Dr. McCoy,” says Spock, shooting McCoy a withering look, “The colony on New Vulcan is the closest Federation planet with the ability to provide the medical assistance required for your injury. Ambassador Spock has agreed to host you. Because of his occupation and advanced age, his home will be well-equipped to meet your physiological needs.”

“Wait,” Jim says, rubbing a temple with the pads of his fingers. “You asked the _Ambassador..._ to babysit me? For four weeks?”

“Six,” McCoy cuts in.

“Spock, that’s--”

“I asked him only to arrange suitable accommodations. It was well within his capacity as a Vulcan Ambassador to do so, or to delegate the task. Hosting you himself was the solution he offered.”

Jim sighs, pulling a hand through his hair as he considers the proposition. “Okay, but I still don’t know if I’m comfortable--”

“Captain, may I speak with you in private for a moment?” Spock asks suddenly.

McCoy looks from him to Jim, eyebrows raised. “I’ll...go check on the lab,” he says, getting up from his chair. When he’s almost out the door he mumbles something that sounds like, _thrown out of my own damn medbay._

“What the hell was that about?” Jim asks.

“I simply thought that it would be...improper to continue this conversation in front of Dr. McCoy.” Spock leans forward, fingers laced together seeming to consider his next words carefully. “The Ambassador indicated that your stay would be welcome, and he became somewhat emotional when speaking of your counterpart. He has, on multiple occasions, stated that his friendship with the Jim Kirk of his universe was significant. He is nearing the end of his life in a place and time that is not his own. I would suggest that a familiar presence might be comforting.”

“Right,” says Jim. “And you couldn’t say that in front of Bones because…?”

Spock’s face contorts into what must be as close as he can get to aghast. “To suggest that the Ambassador had become visibly emotional would be _incredibly_ disrespectful. I mentioned it to you only because I thought that it might convince you of the sincerity of the Ambassador’s offer.” Shifting in his chair, Spock continues, “Also, given that he has been helpful to us in the past, we should consider it our duty to honor what might be viewed as a final request.”

“Okay,” Jim concedes. “It’s not like there’s another option, anyway. Unless you’re willing to let me stay on the Enterprise--”

“I am not.”

Jim laughs softly. “Yeah, I figured.” 

* * *

 

“Jim.”

He hears the voice, but his eyes are too heavy to open, and he can’t get words to form.

“Jim, hey.”

_Say something. Don’t just lay there. He’s going to think you died._

“We’re in orbit.”

It feels like pulling himself up out of thick mud, but he manages to acknowledge McCoy’s voice with a low hum.

“Come on,” McCoy says, pushing an arm underneath Jim’s shoulders and helping him sit up.

“I can do it,” he mumbles, getting to his feet. The room is still spinning all around him, and he only makes it a few steps before McCoy has to guide him back on-course. Jim’s motor skills and spatial awareness had gotten progressively worse over the three days since he was injured. Normal, McCoy had assured him, but it sure as hell doesn’t _feel_ normal. It feels like being in that unholy space between blackout drunk and hungover, all the time.

Another stumble, and McCoy makes him stop. “Let me get a chair,” he says, and Jim tries to work out why he needs a chair if they’re supposed to be beaming down. It takes until McCoy’s already halfway across the medbay for him to figure out that he meant a wheelchair, and not a _chair_ chair.

“I don’t need that,” he insists. “I’m just a little groggy.”

McCoy actually has the gall to laugh at him. “No,” he says, parking the chair next to Jim. “You’re concussed. Sit down. If you’re this unsteady now, you’re gonna fall flat on your ass in the turbolift.”

Jim rolls his eyes, but he knows McCoy’s right, so he lowers himself carefully into the chair. On the way out, McCoy passes him a hazmat bucket, and he knows better than to protest, so he balances it on his lap and just hopes he doesn’t need it.

In the turbolift, he almost _does_ need it, but he manages to close his eyes, breathe through his nose, and keep it down. By the time they reach the transporter room, he’s almost sure that he’s got it under control. McCoy wheels him up onto the platform (after the turbolift, he doesn’t even consider making an argument for transporting down on his own two feet), Spock joining them a moment later. The beam whirrs on, and between the sensation of transport and the sudden rush of arid, scorching air, the first thing Jim does in front of the Ambassador is bend double, clutching the bucket like it’s all that’s connecting him to solid ground, and spill his guts into the thing.

* * *

Spock sees twin looks of subtle shock and panic in the eyes of Dr. T’Voris and her assistant, flanking the Ambassador, before he realizes what’s happening. The doctor recovers first, her experience with Amanda having long since tempered that reaction, but the assistant is new and very young, certainly used to treating Vulcans, who rarely vomit in adulthood unless something is seriously wrong. Neither of them react as quickly as the Ambassador, who unflinchingly takes a knee in front of the Captain’s chair, watching him intently with no expression other than mild concern, until the spell passes and he stands again to pass a hand-towel from T’Voris to the Captain, who takes it gratefully and wipes his mouth with a muffled, “Thanks.”

For a moment so brief that Spock thinks he might have imagined it, the Ambassador seems to reach out toward Jim, something odd about the half-gesture -- familiar, certain, and with a perplexing air of intent -- but it’s withdrawn before Spock can draw any conclusion at all, and lost in the introductions of the Captain and Dr. McCoy to T’Voris and her assistant, T’Ailuk, and McCoy’s explanation of the Captain’s injury and condition as they walk from the square to an adjacent building, the clinic where T’Voris has reestablished her practice.

They take the Captain directly back to an exam room, leaving Spock and the Ambassador in the small waiting area. He considers, briefly, asking his older counterpart about his odd behavior, but it hasn’t been anything quantifiable -- a strange expression, an assertion of the Captain’s importance, a gesture that might have been nothing. Even so, he can’t suppress his curiosity. The Captain is also important to _him,_ a friend, the closest he’s ever had, but as much as he cares for him, he can’t imagine what might lead him to one day regard him with such reverence as the Ambassador seems to. That, he decides, must be what keeps turning his mind back to it -- how disturbing it is to see a version of himself doing things he can’t begin to understand.

“I do not wish to pry, Commander,” the Ambassador says, startling Spock, “but you seem somewhat preoccupied. Is there something on your mind?”

“Nothing consequential,” says Spock. “I was thinking of the ways in which you and I are different. It is somewhat unsettling to me to consider.”

“Uncanny,” he offers. “But I am much older than you are, and even if, as I suspect, the universe eventually heals and rights itself from my interference, you are -- and perhaps always will be -- subtly different than I was. What was it that unsettled you?”

Spock takes a breath, wanting to tread carefully, but in this case, to be both delicate and honest would be impossible. “The way you look at the Captain. The way you speak to him. As you have said, his counterpart was significant, but I cannot imagine growing so attached to him. The very idea that I might is somewhat disturbing.”

“I understand,” says the Ambassador. “Perhaps it would be comforting for you to learn that I feel the same uncanniness?”

“Because you cannot imagine the idea disturbing you?”

Raising an eyebrow, the Ambassador says, “Not at all. It was something I struggled with, something I was ashamed of, for a very long time. That much, we have in common. The differences are less fundamental than that. To see a version of myself carrying on a romance with Lieutenant Uhura is certainly strange, given that I had no such feelings toward her.”

“I was not aware that you disapproved of my relationship with Nyota,” Spock says, taken aback.

“I meant no such implication,” says the Ambassador. “She is an intelligent and highly competent woman. I have no doubt that she will challenge you in all the ways you need to be challenged, should your partnership endure. I do not disapprove; my path simply wasn’t the same as yours. I think the key to our discomfort is to remember that we are not the same, and to try not to question one another’s choices. I can no more fathom your reasoning in choosing her as a companion than you can fathom mine for allowing myself to feel joy at finding myself in a universe where Jim Kirk is alive.” 

* * *

A simple exam shouldn’t be this exhausting, but by the time McCoy and T’Voris have gone over his medical history, taken scans, compared them to old scans, tested his vitals, his vision, his balance, and his reflexes, Jim feels a whole new kind of fatigue. Thankfully, after all that is over, T’Voris has T’Ailuk do some sort of massage to relieve the swelling in his brain while she formulates her treatment plan. The experience of a gorgeous woman running her fingers over his scalp -- accompanied by a strange, but not unpleasant tingling sensation just under her touch -- is only slightly tempered by the fact that McCoy is watching like it’s the single most interesting thing he’s ever seen in his life.

“How does it actually work?” he asks, eyes locked on T’Ailuk’s hands.

“Vulcans have a unique control over our own electromagnetic fields,” she says. “For this therapy, the combination of manual and electromagnetic stimulation is used to pull fluids out of the intracranial space, and direct them into other tissues where they can be safely absorbed.”

McCoy’s eyes light up. “Does it matter what the source of electromagnetic energy is?” he asks.

“I suppose not, given a very careful practitioner,” T’Ailuk concedes. “You would need to monitor the tissue in real time to mimic the feedback we feel naturally, and the source’s control would have to be extremely sensitive in order to navigate through the tissues without damaging them. Hold your tricorder over this section and monitor the fluid. Look at the speed of the drainage. Very slow, and only a small amount at a time.”

McCoy does as she says, and gives a low whistle of appreciation. “Wonder if it could be done mechanically,” he says, and Jim can already tell he intends to find out, even if he has to drag T’Ailuk back to the Enterprise for a sit-down with his entire medical staff and an equipment specialist to make it happen.

“A device that would do just that has been studied,” she says, going to the wall to run her hands under the sonic decon. Jim misses her already. “But the manual procedure is more reliable and thorough. For other species, though, it could be an acceptable alternative therapy.”

From her desk, T’Voris says, “I have a colleague who can send one over when you return for Captain Kirk if you would like to have one, Dr. McCoy.”

“Yeah, I’d love that!” McCoy says, looking like he might kiss her.

Jim can’t help but laugh at the startled expression T’Ailuk makes at the outburst. “Come on, Bones,” he says. “Tone it down. Don’t scare the nice lady. Thank you, by the way,” he adds to T’Ailuk, “I feel a lot better.”

“Yes,” she says, looking a little puzzled. “You have much less pressure on your brain.”

“Well,” says Jim, smiling, “thanks for using your magic touch on me.”

Jim winces internally at her expression -- something between confusion and mortified distaste -- and T’Voris’ raised eyebrow.

McCoy slaps him on the back. “And _I’m_ the scary one.”

Jim starts to mumble an apology, but T’Ailuk, her face once again impassive, says, “It is quite alright. The areas of your brain which regulate emotional and behavioral control are somewhat damaged. Poor interpersonal skills are to be expected.”

McCoy doesn’t say, _Nah, he’s always been like that,_ but Jim can _feel_ him wanting to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now with illustrations, which I'm going to try to do for each chapter.
> 
> I think this chapter contains more heterosexuality than everything else on my AO3, combined.
> 
> Fun stuff:  
> -I imagine that the device McCoy is talking to the doctors about is the same one he uses on Chekov in The Voyage Home.  
> -T'Voris' name was made from combining a name with the popular feminine "T'" prefix.  
> -T'Ailuk's name is kind of an inside joke. While browsing a list of Vulcan names with translations, I put Spock's full name together, and it sounded like a Discworld goblin name. So, I hunted down a Vulcan dictionary, did a translation, and contracted the translation according to the conventions of the names in that chart, and T'Ailuk's full name is "Ved Sha T'Ailuk", which translates to, "Tears of the Mushroom"; bezhun-mashaya (tears) t’(of)taik-luk (mushroom) -> Ved Sha T’Ailuk.
> 
> Follow me on Tumblr (mostlyhydratrash) to watch me melt down while writing and researching this shit.


	3. Inhibition

It’s darker in the lobby than it was in the exam room, and Jim is eternally grateful that Vulcans apparently have excellent low-light vision, because even the brightest room he’s encountered is still darker than sickbay after lights-out. And Vulcans seem to utilize flashing lights much less in their technology than humans -- everything unobtrusive, obscured by craftsmanship. He hadn’t even realized how much being around something as simple as _light_ had been running him down until he was in a place where all the lights were gentle, low and reddish. He’s even getting used to the heat.

Spock and the Ambassador stand to greet them. “Dr. McCoy,” says Spock. “Are you sufficiently convinced that Captain Kirk will be well taken care of?”

McCoy chuckles, rolling Jim’s folded wheelchair out of the corner. Jim’s grateful that he doesn’t insist on using it. “They know what they’re doing,” he says, only a little grudgingly. “I’m ready whenever you are.”

“Oh, you won’t be staying as well, doctor?” asks the Ambassador. “I had assumed you would not accept another physician’s having exclusive control over Jim’s care.”

“Didn’t say I liked it,” McCoy says with a shrug as they file out into the square. “But the Enterprise can’t take off for a month and a half without a CMO, and he’s in good hands here.”

The corners of the Ambassador’s mouth lift almost imperceptibly. “Understandable. Though I regret that you must leave so soon. In my time, I very much enjoyed our conversations.”

McCoy’s eyes widen, and he looks between the Ambassador and Spock, as if trying to reconcile one with the other. “Uh. Thanks,” he says, then turns to Jim, handing him a canvas bag. “I packed some stuff from your cabin. Clothes, toiletries. Put a few snacks in there, too…”

“Thanks,” Jim says, a little guiltily. “I didn’t even think about that stuff.”

Pushing the chair slightly forward, McCoy asks, “Think this’ll come in handy?”

“Nah, I’m pretty steady now,” says Jim. Then, realizing the question might not have been much about the chair at all, he adds, “I’ll be alright, Bones,” and pulls him in for a hug. “See you in six weeks.”

“Stay out of trouble.”

Jim smiles, “No promises, but I’ll try. Spock...take care of my ship.”

“Of course, Captain. Ambassador.”

They exchange a salute, Spock calls the Enterprise to beam them up, and then they’re gone, and Jim is the only human on an unfamiliar planet, and six weeks suddenly seems a lot longer. He stares up overhead for a few moments -- his long-distance vision is still good, even if everything up close is doubled. The Enterprise is just barely visible in the dusky sky, a tiny pinpoint of light trailing across for a few moments before blinking out as she warps away.

When he finally looks back down, he staggers, a wave of dizziness washing over him. The Ambassador catches him by the arm, and Jim mentally adds “looking up” to the growing list of things he can’t do anymore.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah,” he says. “Balance is really off.”

Jim doesn’t mention the odd sensation blooming in his head and down his spine -- a sort of buzz, a reverberation, as if someone were millimeters away from touching him.

“We had better get you home,” says the Ambassador.

* * *

They set off at a slow pace down the wide road from the square, and Jim leans a little more heavily on the Ambassador’s arm the longer they walk, thinking maybe he should have let McCoy leave him the chair, even though it’s not far. When they reach it, the Ambassador’s home is a contrast to the tall buildings around the square -- low and set back from the road just ahead of a steep hill, with narrow windows and a small courtyard in front. The closer red star is almost completely below the horizon, just a faint crimson glow over the distant mountains, but its fainter companion, still high in the northwest, illuminates the valley, casting a dim blue glow over the vast, rocky terrain beyond the edge of the colony and silhouetting the house in sharp contrast against the deep reds and purples of the sky.

Jim suddenly becomes aware that they’ve stopped short of the path leading up to the house, the Ambassador waiting patiently while he had apparently been staring slack-jawed at the sunset. He mumbles a sheepish, “Sorry.”

“Quite alright,” the Ambassador says, leading him up the path. “It _is_ beautiful.”

Jim laughs as they step inside. “I didn’t think Vulcans cared about that sort of thing.”

“You are mistaken,” he says, shrugging off his coat and hanging it by the door. “Beauty, especially the beauty of the natural world, is almost universally appreciated.”

“It’s just hard to imagine you-- Spock-- the other one...calling something _beautiful._ ”

The Ambassador looks at him for a long moment, eyes searching. “At his age, I was exceptionally reserved. I felt the need to prove myself. Often at the expense of things I should have savored without a second thought. It is my sincere hope that he realize sooner than I did that _shame_ is a more dangerous emotion than any other, with the possible exception of _regret._ ”

Jim doesn’t know what to say, so he just nods, and busies himself looking around the room. It’s a sort of entry hall -- Jim doesn’t know much about Vulcan architecture, but he can guess that the room they’re in is an area for entertaining guests, with several doors along the back wall, likely guest bedrooms. Most Vulcan homes have areas like this one specifically to maintain the separation and privacy of the main house, but it’s somewhat larger and grander in the home of an Ambassador than Jim remembers from the diagrams in his cultural studies textbooks.

“Are you hungry?” the Ambassador asks.

Jim shakes his head, “Nah. Too nauseous. I think I just need to get some sleep.”

“Very well. I have a room ready for you. Follow me.”

The Ambassador doesn’t lead Jim through one of the doors, as he expects, but up the staircase, into the part of the home reserved only for family. It makes sense, considering his injury and T’Voris’ strict instructions that he not be left alone until the danger of a second injury passes, but nonetheless, he feels the weight of his imposition. The room the Ambassador takes him to, off a hallway just past the large, open living area and office with a circular window overlooking the valley, is the middle of three bedrooms, very dim and sparse. Just a bed, set low against the wall, and a small dresser beside it.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Jim rifles through his bag for clothes to sleep in, but he keeps forgetting what he’s looking for. By the third time he’s shuffled the entire contents of the bag, the Ambassador, with an even expression, says, “Are you missing something?”

“I...um. Clothes,” Jim stumbles, the fog in his brain thickening the more he tries to muscle through it. A swell of shame rises in his chest when the Ambassador reaches forward and takes the bag out of his hands like he’s a child who can’t manage the simple task of getting dressed for bed. The fact that it _is_ the reality of his situation only makes it worse.

The Ambassador sets the bag aside and opens a dresser drawer, pulling out a short, white robe. Jim is relieved when he doesn’t ask if he can undress himself, because it means he doesn’t have to admit that he’s fairly sure he _couldn’t_ right now. He just pulls Jim’s shirt and undershirt over his head by the hems, tugs off his boots, and helps him to stand long enough to open his button and zipper and push his pants down his thighs.

While the Ambassador retrieves the robe, Jim crosses his arms over his chest. It seems that his injury has really done a number on his emotions, and not just his ability to regulate them, but to even recognize them. He keeps getting flashes of emotion that feel completely foreign -- a sudden drop in the pit of his stomach and a hollowness in his throat. He feels like he might crawl out of his own skin, and then, as quickly as it had come on, it’s gone, and the Ambassador is wrapping him carefully in the robe. The drag of the cool fabric over his skin soothes away some of his embarrassed discomfort, enough that he can relax and watch as steady hands fasten the three ties, one each at the shoulder and hip, and a wider belt around the waist.

“Thank you.”

The Ambassador’s eyes relax, and the corners of his lips rise a fraction. No matter how minute, it’s unquestionably a smile. “Jim,” he says as he helps him lie down, one hand under his shoulder, and the other spanning the back of his neck to cradle his head. “You would have done the same for me.”

* * *

For two weeks, Jim does very little but sleep, dreamless and deep, never fully waking. When he does occasionally come to enough to be aware of his surroundings, the Ambassador is almost always there, sitting at the end of the bed, sometimes bringing a meal or glass of water that he helps Jim to drink from, sometime changing him into a fresh robe, and sometimes just watching over him. This time is different, though. The Ambassador is absent, and for once, Jim is wide awake. Not clear-headed by any means, but the heavy drowsiness has disappeared entirely.

From the look of the sky through the window, it’s an hour or so before dawn. A sudden sharp pang of hunger reminds Jim that he’s been eating too little, and too infrequently, just a few bites here and there of whatever the Ambassador brought him. He hadn’t had much of an appetite, but now, he’s ravenous, so he gathers his robe closer around him and tiptoes down the hall to the Ambassador’s bedroom, entering quietly in case he’s asleep.

Jim’s heart races when he sees the Ambassador, on his back on the high platform bed in the center of the room, his eyes wide open. For a moment, Jim is sure he’s dead, until he sees the steady rise and fall of his chest. Apparently, Vulcans sleep with their eyes open. It’s incredibly unnerving.

Deciding to let the Ambassador sleep, Jim makes his way down to the main area of the house and sticks his head in doors until he finds the kitchen. There’s a small food synthesizer on one counter, and a few cards on a neatly-organized rack beside it, but they’re all labeled in Vulcan. He considers, briefly, just raiding the pantry and trying to cook something from scratch, then reconsiders when he thinks about all the steps involved. He’s not good at cooking even when he’s in top form, and he doesn’t want to burn the Ambassador’s house to the ground trying to make food at his current level of cognitive functioning.

He considers the cards for a long moment, then selects one at random, inserting it into the slot of the synthesizer. He selects the top-middle button of the iteration keypad, and hopes that it’s not inverted and he doesn’t end up with eight servings instead of two. A few seconds later, the door slides open, revealing two tall, steaming ceramic cups.

Jim pulls them out and lifts one to his nose. The creamy, greenish-brown liquid smells something like coffee, possibly a local variety. It’s not exactly food, but Jim has apprehensions about trying another card. There’s a bowl of dark, red-rinded fruit on the opposite counter, so he searches through the drawers and cabinets until he finds a knife and a plate and cuts two of them into wedges. The fruit smells a little like pineapple, but richer and fattier, with an opaque pink flesh and a pit like an avocado. There are a few of the same pits in a small woven basket next to the bowl, so he places the two alongside them, then goes in search of something like a tray to help him carry everything upstairs, which he finds on top of the synthesizer. There’s something else...something about Vulcans and utensils. He can’t remember if they don’t use them at all or if they _always_ use them. It’s one of the two. Did he see some in a drawer? He can’t remember. It’s a good thing the coffee came out so hot.

Finally, he finds the drawer. One side is filled with wide spoons, and the other with what really look like tweezers or forceps to Jim. Forceps, it is. He grabs two pairs and takes the tray in both hands. The stairs are difficult alone, more so going up than down, so he leans heavily on the wall and makes his way up at a careful pace.

“Ambassador Spock?” he calls as he enters the room. The Ambassador is still asleep, open-eyed.

Or rather, not exactly _open,_ Jim realizes, as a translucent membrane retracts into the corners of the Ambassador’s eyes, and he sits up. “Is everything alright?” he asks, a slight edge of drowsiness to his voice.

Jim lifts the tray slightly. “I made breakfast,” he says. “I hope that’s okay.”

A little exhale accompanies the Ambassador’s not-quite-smile this time. A laugh. Jim wonders if the other Spock is this expressive, and he’s just never noticed it before. “That is very thoughtful of you, Jim,” he says, standing and taking the tray over the window, where there are two chairs with an ornate pedestal table in between. “But in the future, you should wake me first. You could have fallen on the stairs.”

“Honestly, I don’t even remember getting out of bed,” Jim says as he takes his seat and lifts a cup to his mouth. The flavor is something like a mix between coffee and chai, with an earthy, herbal undercurrent, slightly sweet, and not so much creamy as fatty. “I think I’m still pretty out of it. I don’t even know what any of this stuff is. This is good, though.”

“ _Theris kov-sayas,_ ” the Ambassador provides. “‘Vulcan mocha’. And this is _gespar_. It is an interesting coincidence; this is the same breakfast your counterpart and I often shared. It was one of the few things we could agree on.”

Jim tries to use a utensil to pick up the gespar, but his fine motor skills won’t allow it. He puts the tongs to the side and just picks a wedge up with his fingers, hoping he’s not being too offensive. It’s halfway to his mouth when he’s struck by a chill down the back of his neck, and an intense discomfort. Another of the strange episodes he’s been having, the impossible-to-pin-down feelings accompanied by odd physical sensations. He wonders if they aren’t some kind of seizure.

“Jim?”

He shakes it off as best he can, breathes out through his nose until the feeling is just a dull gnawing in his stomach. “Sorry,” he says. “Just felt really strange for a minute. I’m okay now.”

The Ambassador’s brow furrows, but he doesn’t make any further comment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since I couldn't find any translation of "Vulcan mocha", I made one up: Theris - "tea", kov-sayas - "nut" (literally, "[seed of] a single-seeded fruit"). I figure it's made similarly to coffee, perhaps with two different plants, one similar in flavor to cacao, one similar to coffee.


	4. Synchronicity

Progress is slow and tedious -- therapy every other day, honing his balance, his reflexes, his memory, retraining his brain to do all the tasks it easily did before. It’s anything but gentle; Vulcan healing is brutally efficient. T’Ailuk sticks him on a balance board and walks in circles around him, pushing against his shoulders, chest, back, knees, while two screens in front of him flash questions for him to answer on staggered timers, one testing his short-term memory, the other quizzing him on Starfleet equipment and procedures. As demanding as it is, she’s patient whenever Jim gets overwhelmed and snaps at her, which seems to happen more or less at random. Every day feels like his level of functioning is just up to chance. By the sixth session, he’s learned not to apologize for his temper; apologies are only met with puzzlement. To her, not only is it the nature of his injury to make him easily frustrated, it’s the very nature of his _species._

Normally, the Ambassador would accompany him, but he’s been away on a diplomatic assignment for the last three days, so Jim walks back to the house alone and settles in. Before this injury, he thought he knew what monotony was, but right now? He’d do just about anything for what he thought of as “boredom” before -- cataloging, filing reports, diplomatic escort missions, orbiting some backwoods planet for days or weeks on end with nothing to do but play endless games of chess or peruse the ship’s library to kill time. Cognitive rest means he can’t tax his brain by so much as _looking_ at a screen outside of therapy, and he’s never seen the point in playing chess without a partner.

Adding fuel to the fire is the fact that he seems to have developed intense insomnia. It started a few nights before Ambassador Spock left -- he’d try to sleep, but it just wouldn’t come no matter how long he lay there, until, finally, when he reached complete exhaustion, he would drop off for three or four hours, then wake, still tired, but totally alert. In the last three days, it’s been even worse than before, and he hasn’t gotten more than an hour a night. So, for twenty hours or so each day, he sits in a chair in front of the big window in the living room and looks out over the valley, watching small animals scurry between the rocks, plantlife swaying in the wind, and the shadows, sometimes doubled in the early evening by the twin stars.

* * *

It’s just after dusk when Jim stands suddenly and wanders down the stairs, then out through the entryway. He’s at the garden wall when he realizes he doesn’t remember why he came out. Maybe he meant to go to the kitchen and took a wrong turn. He’s done that a lot lately -- walked into rooms and had no idea what he meant to do there. This feels different, somehow. Less like he forgot what he was doing, and more like his body just got up and walked him out to the gate of it’s own volition. He’s just about to turn back when the air out in the road begins to shimmer. The transporter auras coalesce into four figures -- Ambassador Spock and his entourage. That must be it, he decides; the Ambassador must have told him when he expected to return, and even though Jim didn’t consciously remember, he knew, on some level or another, that he should go out to meet him. As soon as the last of the beam has faded, the Ambassador walks swiftly to Jim, brows furrowed.

“Are you alright?” he asks, a concerned hand on Jim’s bicep. “You look disoriented.”

Jim shakes his head. “No, I’m fine,” he says. “Just couldn’t sit in that chair anymore. Good timing, though.”

“Indeed,” says the Ambassador before turning to the three men. “Come inside, please.”

There’s something off about the cadence of his voice, but Jim can’t quite place it. He hopes the assignment didn’t go badly. Just in case it did, he stays back a few steps and follows them into the house without interrupting their conversation. Ambassador Spock makes a brief introduction of his entourage -- Counsellors Nomikh and Stallat, and Senva, the youngest among them, who Jim gathers is something like an intern -- and they settle on the couches under the large, south-facing windows, while the Ambassador goes to the kitchen. Jim isn’t sure if he should follow and help, or if he would be more of a hindrance, so he stays behind.

“I am curious as to your opinion on renegotiation, Counsellor Nomikh,” Senva says.

Nomikh, the broader of the two older men, considers it for a moment. “Access to the Gelek system is vital if this colony is to grow. A few concessions are warranted.”

“A few, yes,” says Stallat, “but I would suggest that what the Buralans ask goes beyond that. Sharing the resources of the Gelek system would be reasonable. However, there is simply no precedent for one planetary government to ask another to not only share resources in an unincorporated system, but to allow them access to the resources of that government’s system, as well….Such an agreement could be arranged, but it would require separate negotiations.”

“Wait,” Jim blurts out, before he can think better of it. “The Buralans want access to _this_ system’s other planets in exchange for access to the Gelek system, is that right?”

The men all stare at him, taken aback.

“Sorry,” he says quickly, shifting in his seat. “It’s just that, if that’s what they want, there _is_ precedent for it -- Deneva and Keto-Enol. They agreed to share resources in an adjacent system, but the Enolians also wanted access to Denevan resources to offset their loss. The Denevans accepted, but on the condition that the Enolians gave back ten percent of what they mined from the Denevan system, and established no permanent settlements in either system. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to interrupt, but it was a similar situation, and you could definitely use it to ask the Buralans for a little more.”

“No need to apologize, Captain,” Nomikh says. “You are correct; the agreements _are_ very similar. And I cannot speak for the others, but for my part, I was simply surprised at how well-spoken you are. Very rare in one of your species.”

Stallat and Senva nod their agreement as Ambassador Spock comes in from the kitchen with a tray bearing five cups and a tall decanter.

Rising to help with the tea, Senva says, “Ambassador, the Captain has clearly made good use of his time with you. You have taught him quite well.”

Jim’s face feels hot. These men think he’s a complete idiot, and they’re patronizing him. The fact that Ambassador gives no response barely takes a bit of the sting out of it. He stews on his indignation while his tea gets cold, and the four of them hammer out the finer points of their counterproposal to the Buralans. He doesn’t say another word until they stand to leave, when he gives them a polite, if a little tense _goodbye,_ and helps Ambassador Spock to gather up the dishes.

“Jim,” he says. “I overheard your conversation with the Counsellors. Are you aware that Nomikh complimented your language abilities because you were, in fact, speaking fluent Vulcan?”

“What? I wasn’t.”

“I assure you, you were. Granted, your syntax was somewhat strange.”

Jim shakes his head. “No, I was speaking English, and so were they. One of them must have left their translator on.”

“Doubtful,” says the Ambassador. “I have spent so long around humans that translators generally do not detect English as foreign to me. If you were speaking it, I would have heard it unaltered.”

“Okay,” Jim says as they head upstairs. “But I don’t speak Vulcan. Not a word.”

Taking the chair opposite Jim’s in front of the window, Ambassador Spock says, “There are other possibilities.”

“Such as? What? I got hit on the head and my brain rewired itself to speak a language I’ve heard maybe three or four times in my entire life?”

“That is unlikely. But Vulcans _are_ touch-telepaths. It is possible that your brain, in its weakened state, absorbed some of the language. You have had consistent physical contact with your doctors.”

“And you.”

As soon as the words come out of his mouth, Jim regrets saying them. It sounds too much like an accusation. He looks away, out the window, to the clear sky full of brilliant stars, until, finally, Ambassador Spock speaks again.

“I am afraid you may be correct,” he says, his voice heavy. “I should have been careful not to make any direct contact. I knew that your present state could result in...unpredictable side effects. That is why T’Ailuk performs any procedure that requires skin contact. She is uniquely capable of doing so without transference. I, apparently, am not. I am sorry, Jim.”

Giving him a smile, Jim shrugs and says, “Hey, if the worst thing you’ve done is made me bilingual, I think I can live with that. Besides,” he continues, a little more quietly, less sure, his eyes to the floor, “I understand. Why you _weren’t_ careful, I mean. The other version of me-- you knew him for a long time. You were close with him. I don’t know how much you know about it, but two years ago, when you...your counterpart was in the core chamber, he was dying and I couldn’t _do_ anything except watch, and keep talking to him. I just kept _pawing_ at the glass. I would’ve given anything to be able to put a hand on him, give him some kind of comfort. And then when we finally got him back-- God, I was a mess….You letting me lean on your arm a little longer than I need to is nothing compared to that. Any excuse I had to touch him -- prove he was there, he was alive, he was real...I think it probably _really_ freaked him ou--”

Jim stops dead in his tracks when he looks up at Ambassador Spock, his face bloodless and openly shocked, eyes wide, glistening, and a hand covering his mouth.

“Oh, Jim…” he says, breathless and panicked. “Something is very wrong.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: some goddamn answers. Not all of them, but some.
> 
> No illustration for this chapter yet, but hopefully, I'll get one up soon.


	5. Confession

“What?” Jim demands. He crosses the space between them, crouching by Ambassador Spock’s chair and placing a tentative hand on his arm. “What is it?”

In an instant, the Ambassador’s hand flies to Jim’s forearm, gripping tightly and holding it away from his body, any illusions of frailty shattered by his strength and the dangerous flash in his eyes.

“Don’t,” he says sharply before releasing Jim from his grasp. “Touching me may cause further damage.”

“Damage?” Jim asks, rubbing at the fresh bruise forming around his wrist. “What are you talking about? What--”

“The incident with Khan, the core chamber. When you remember it, _you_ are not the one inside the chamber?”

Jim narrows his eyes. “No. Why--”

“Are you _certain?_ ”

“Yes!” Jim says, growing more alarmed by the interrogation every the second. “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

“Think about it carefully. Think about the ship, the crew, the uniforms.”

Jim searches his memory for anything, any tiny clue that might tell him why the Ambassador is reacting so violently. Running down to engineering -- struggling to stay upright as the ship tumbles over and over itself. Then, it stabilizes. He reaches the core chamber, toward the front of the--

No. That’s not right. The door to the core chamber is at the back of the engineering hull, not the front. Isn’t it?

It has to be. He’s positive. He’s been labeling maps of the Enterprise in therapy four times a week. The door should be at the back, then the narrow access tunnel that runs alongside the conduit, then the core injectors.

No.

The core chamber is at the front. The injector assembly is in the center. Behind it, Spock is slumped against the wall when Jim reaches the door and calls out to him. He struggles to his feet and straightens his coat by the hem.

No.

The uniform is _wrong._ A red coat, belted, with a strap over the shoulder, fastened across the chest over a white, knit, high-collared shirt. Jim can see his own reflection in the glass, wearing the same. He looks _old._

“Jim.”

Ambassador Spock’s voice snaps him out of it. Jim looks up at him. Tries to speak, but he can’t. His mind is still racing, unable to make sense of the memories.

Finally, he finds his voice to ask, “What’s wrong with me?”

The Ambassador lets out a long sigh, his previous agitation draining from his face all at once, leaving him looking tired. “Something that should not be possible,” he says. “If it were simple transference, you would hear my thoughts, feel my emotions, as if they were your own. You might, given your compromised state, even experience my memories and confuse them for your own. But you are remembering things as _my_ Jim Kirk experienced them.”

“Why?” Jim asks, finally returning to his chair. “How does that even happen?”

“I have a theory,” says Ambassador Spock, leaning forward, fingers laced pensively. “You and I, in my time, shared a telepathic bond, a sort of permanent equivalent of the mind-meld. There are varying degrees of connection between bonded individuals. Ours being particularly strong, I suspect that when I melded with you on Delta Vega, it could have been reforged in spite of the fact that you share no such bond with my counterpart. Incidentally, it is probably the bond that allowed you to speak and understand Vulcan -- using my mind to translate.”

“And it’s dangerous?”

“Now that we are in close proximity, the bond is strengthening, and my mind is attempting to repair the damage to yours, but in the process, it is introducing conflicting information. It is that dissonance which is dangerous to you. If left unresolved, it could cause you to go mad.”

Running a hand through his hair, Jim sighs. “So how do we fix it?”

“In the morning, we will take you to T’Voris. She will confirm that we are bonded and determine the extent to which it is affecting your recovery. If it is necessary to break the bond to ensure your safety, she will contact a specialist for you.”

Jim nods his agreement, but there’s a lump in his throat and an ache in his chest, a deep, miserable feeling. It’s not his own; he knows that now, though he experiences it just the same as if it were. Curious, he focuses on the feeling. If he can read Ambassador Spock’s emotions, shouldn’t he also be able to understand them? There’s a flash -- a broken cup, and a palm streaked with an olive stain, sudden breathlessness, like a blow to the gut -- and then it’s gone, like a door snapping shut.

“Jim,” Ambassador Spock says, patient, but firm. “I appreciate your curiosity, but you must not do that. If the bond between us is indeed harmful to you, it would be unwise to use it intentionally.”

“I-” Jim stutters, embarrassed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to--”

“You want to know why the prospect of breaking our bond is...unpleasant to me,” Ambassador Spock ventures. “The memory you saw was mine. You had gone missing, presumed dead, and then, one night, many years later, I felt you call out to me, still alive, still linked to my mind. For eight minutes and thirty-two seconds, I could sense you as vividly as if you were in the same room.” He swallows and takes a long breath before continuing. “And then the bond was suddenly severed. That moment, the moment I felt you die, is what you’ve just seen. I am not especially eager to repeat the experience.”

“Oh,” says Jim, lamely. He feels like he should offer the Ambassador _something,_ a condolence, an apology for dredging it up, but it feels too surreal to be talking to someone about his own death. Instead, he decides to stick to solutions. “And there’s no way to just leave it? If we’re careful not to touch, or...I don’t know, they do something to keep it from hurting me?”

“All questions for the morning,” Ambassador Spock replies, standing. “I am badly in need of a full night’s sleep, and so, I suspect, are you.”

“Yeah.”

Jim follows the Ambassador down the hall, pausing outside the door to his bedroom and watching him retreat into the shadows, only the white in his hair catching the dim light from the hall. “Spock,” he calls out. “Goodnight.”

* * *

In his own room, Jim doesn’t sleep. A sense of unease settles over him as he lays staring at the ceiling. Through the wall, he can hear soft rustling and faint, pacing footsteps. Every time he closes his eyes, he sees flashes of things -- those memories that can’t belong to him. Nonsensical glimpses bleeding in and out of each other and his own, real memories, buzzing around in his brain, throbbing at the back of his neck and high in his chest, twisting up his stomach.

His breath catches in his throat. He can’t stop the sounds and images from racing through his head. Distant and hazy, he can hear himself gasping, whimpering, but he can’t get a grip on himself. He can’t even move.

“Jim.”

He hears Spock’s voice, but his response won’t come, only more ragged, panting groans.

“Jim!”

He needs to respond, to tell him he’s okay. He can feel Spock’s panic and uncertainty; he wants to hold Jim steady, meld with him to share the balance of his mind and bring him down from the attack, but it’s just as likely to hurt as to help, and he’s at a loss for what to do.

“Jim, can you hear me?”

“Y-Yes…” he finally grits out, grabbing onto the Ambassador’s arm, desperate for stability. “What’s...h-happening...to m-m-me?”

The Ambassador shakes his head. “I do not know,” he says, lifting Jim from the bed and holding him against his chest. He carries him down the hall, to the bathroom, and leans him gently against the cool stone tile while he fills the tub.

The sound of running water gives Jim something outside his own head to focus on, and by the time the tub is full, he can get to his feet on his own, albeit unsteadily. He leans against Ambassador Spock’s chest while warm hands unfasten his robe and slide it off his shoulders. Everywhere they come into contact with his skin, Jim feels a rush of...something. He can’t identify it, but it calms him and soothes away the trembling chill in his limbs. Even better is the steaming water the Ambassador lowers him into.

He lets his head fall back against the rim of the tub and looks up, to where the Ambassador is kneeling by its side.

“Thanks,” he says hoarsely.

The Ambassador nods, settling cross-legged on the floor while Jim soaks, the buzz slowly draining from his body with each deep breath. They stay there until the water goes cold, and the Ambassador passes Jim a towel from the rack as he steps out of the draining tub.

“I must’ve been really comfortable with you,” he muses, wrapping the towel around his waist. “That...attack, whatever it was. You, having to carry me in here and put me in the bath...I should be embarrassed, but I’m not. I feel...safe.”

“I’m glad,” says the Ambassador, but he looks troubled. Jim can almost feel it for a moment, and then it’s like a brick wall comes down between them. It’s strange, and hard for Jim to wrap his head around, considering he’s not even used to being linked to the Ambassador yet, but the sudden disconnect makes his chest ache.

“Are you...okay?” he asks lamely, trading the towel for his robe, which he fastens hurriedly, feeling somehow more exposed than he had before.

“Tired,” the Ambassador offers, turning out the light as they file into the hall. “We should get as much rest as we can before morning. Do not hesitate to wake me, however, should you need to.”

“Yeah.”

* * *

The racing thoughts and panic don’t return, but Jim remains sleepless and on-edge. It’s well past midnight when he finally drifts into uneasy dreams, and when he wakes, it feels as if he only dropped off for a moment, though the light from his window tells him it has to have been several hours.

He pulls himself out of bed, body aching, and looks through the dresser drawers, his own clothes long since pushed to the back in favor of the more climate-appropriate attire Ambassador Spock had leant him, and settles on a light tunic and close-fitting leggings -- easy to remove for an examination, but still affording enough protection from the heat and sun.

In the main room, the Ambassador has already laid out a tray of theris kov-sayas and gespar, along with the little rolls of bread that Jim won’t touch -- oddly spicy and strangely-textured -- for himself. Jim still feels the wall between them, but he doesn’t have the words to ask why. The Ambassador, he reasons, is probably trying to protect him. They eat quickly and in relative silence, both eager to get to T’Voris’ office, to have a diagnosis, a path forward. As soon as the dishes are put away in the kitchen, they head out, taking their cloaks from beside the door and pulling up the hoods against a harsh, dusty wind.

* * *

When they arrive, T’Voris ushers them into the main exam room, where they sit in the chairs opposite her desk.

“I understand you are having new symptoms,” she says. “Please describe them.”

“Well,” says Jim, glancing at the Ambassador, “I’m not really sure how to...to say it. I’m, uh...having memories. That aren’t mine. And last night I had...I don’t know, some kind of panic attack?”

“Most likely telepathic transference,” T’Voris supplies. “Normally, it would not be cause for concern, but given your injury and weakened mental state, your brain is likely unable to reconcile others’ thoughts with your own. Avoiding physical contact with Vulcans should prevent it.”

“It is not transference,” Ambassador Spock interrupts, prompting a raised eyebrow from T’Voris. “You are aware of my situation. In the previous timeline, I was telepathically bonded with Jim’s counterpart. The foreign memories are his, not mine, and they seem to occur whether or not we are in contact.”

“And you suspect that your bond with the counterpart has extended to him?” she asks. “It is possible. Your situation is unique, of course, so there are no case studies or research to recommend an appropriate treatment. However, there are documented cases of accidental or forced bonding. If this presents similarly, we can use similar treatments.”

T’Voris stands and retrieves a small handheld scanner from a drawer across the room. She passes it first across Jim’s forehead, then the Ambassador’s. On the screen next to her desk, the scans and wave-forms display, individually and then overlaid.

“You are linked,” she confirms, gesturing to a section of the overlaid wave-patterns. “You see this area here? The waves are nearly identical. Based on this imaging, I would also conclude that the bond is causing damage, similar to T’lokan schism.”

“So, what do we do?” Jim asks. “Is there a way to fix it?”

T’Voris nods. “There are two options,” she says. “Either the bond can be broken -- removing the foreign memories which are causing damage -- or we can attempt restoration, which will reconcile the foreign memories with your own and realign the telepathic bond so that the information it introduces will be accepted by your brain. The decision is yours alone, but there are consequences to both procedures that you must understand before making it.”

“Consequences?” Jim asks.

“By our laws, no one can be forced to maintain a bond they do not wish to have,” she explains, “But to break a bond is for the young. That is a large part of why we are betrothed so early; so that the bond can be safely broken if that is the wish of one or both partners. A young mind can recover from the trauma of separation. An old one cannot. If you choose severance, Spock will almost certainly die.”

Jim swallows, looking astoundedly between T’Voris and the Ambassador. “Okay, that’s not an option. What about the other procedure?”

“If you choose restoration, the bond will remain intact, and he will live out the rest of his natural life, but you will be fundamentally changed. Your thoughts and memories and those of your counterpart will coexist without distinction. However, as I said, there is no precedent for this condition. Restoration may not be successful, or it may simply exacerbate your existing symptoms. Even under normal circumstances, a Vulcan bonding with another species has its risks. Those are only compounded by your injury and the unintentional nature of the bond.”

The Ambassador clears his throat and asks, “What do you recommend, T’Voris?”

“Forgive me, Ambassador,” she says, “but, given your already advanced age, and the risk and uncertainty involved in restoration, my recommendation is for severance.”

Jim laughs incredulously. “No,” he says. “Absolutely not. I’ll do the restoration.”

“Jim,” Ambassador Spock says evenly. “You must consider--”

“What? _Killing you_?” Jim interrupts. “No. You don’t even _want_ to break it, and neither do I. There’s no reason--”

“It is precisely because I _do not_ want to break the bond that you must consider it an option.”

“It is possible,” T’Voris offers, “that you are misinterpreting the Ambassador’s desires as your own. If your ability to consent is impaired, then it is imperative that you carefully and empirically weigh the potential costs and benefits of each choice. I will contact the resident tel-hassu -- a specialist in bonding disorders. She should be able to see you tomorrow and perform whichever procedure you choose.”

* * *

On the walk home, he finally can’t contain it anymore. “You seriously think I should do something that’ll kill you, just because the other option _might_ not work?” he blurts, drawing a sidelong glance from a young couple as they pass.

“Jim,” he says, a shade of impatience creeping into his voice, “I am one hundred and sixty years old. The handful of years I have left are more than an acceptable sacrifice for the _decades_ left to you. And I might also remind you that, should the restoration procedure fail, and you die, the bond will be severed, and I will still die. That is to say nothing of everything the world would lose in losing you.”

“That’s a lot of ‘ifs’, Spock,” Jim says. “All stacked against one big ‘definitely’. I’m just saying, why can’t we try restoration, and if it doesn’t work, if I get worse, then we’ll break the bond?”

“If that is your decision, we certainly can. Were it not possible to break the bond after an attempt at restoration, I would insist on severance regardless of your wishes. It would only be--”

“No,” Jim interrupts. “Don’t say it. If you say it, I might actually knock you on your ass.”

“If it would make you feel better,” the Ambassador says with something that looks suspiciously like an eyeroll as they approach the house.

* * *

 As the day stretches on, Jim takes his seat at the window, listening in on the Ambassador’s communications -- one from the tel-hassu, setting Jim’s appointment for the morning -- and quiet typing as he does his work for the day. He finally gets bored enough to pull the lyre off of its stand and pluck at its strings tunelessly, fiddling with each knob in turn to try and determine their functions.

The Ambassador tolerantly endures thirty minutes of the noise Jim produces before he pointedly says, “Would you like to play a few games of chess?”

“Oh, god, yes,” Jim says eagerly, placing the lyre back on the stand as Ambassador Spock sets the board. They play until past sunset, when only the blue star shines through the window, just bright enough to illuminate the board. Jim loses more than he wins, and wonders whether he’s not as good at playing chess anymore, or if the Ambassador just finally got used to his feints and distractions over the years. In the middle of the last game, the Ambassador stares at the board, nearly unblinking, for several long minutes.

“Hey,” says Jim. “Are you planning on making a move, or…?”

“My apologies,” he says briskly, shifting his remaining knight up a level.

“What were you thinking about?” Jim asks, suddenly hyper-aware of the Ambassador’s closed-off state.

“If it is your intention to pursue restoration, there is...a conversation which we must have. Something that you ought to hear from me rather than find out during the procedure. But I am afraid that having it would influence your decision.”

Jim shakes his head, capturing a pawn. “It won’t. I already told you. I’m doing the restoration.”

“And you are absolutely certain of that choice?” asks the Ambassador, moving his queen out of danger.

“Couldn’t change my mind if you tried.”

“In my time,” he says evenly, “you were my husband.”

Jim’s hand freezes above the board, his strategy completely forgotten as he stares, slack-jawed at the Ambassador.

“Your…?”

Even though he’s shocked, he knows that it’s true. It makes sense of everything that’s happened, everything that he’s felt in the last three weeks. Hearing it said aloud just makes it seem obvious. In another life, he loved this man, and since that life had somehow managed to spill over into this one, he loved him now, just the same as then.

He should say something, but his mind is a blank, so before he can think better of it, he stands and crosses to the Ambassador’s chair, taking him firmly by the shoulders and kissing him. For a moment, the veil between them lifts, and his mind is flooded with surprise and then agonizing need, but the Ambassador’s resolve only cracks for a moment before he presses a firm hand to his chest.

“Jim,” he says raggedly. “Don’t.”

“I’m sorry,” Jim breathes, stepping back and looking away. “I thought--”

“You are not in your right mind,” he says, his voice gentle. “If you were to regret--”

“I won’t.”

The Ambassador shakes his head. “We can’t be certain of that,” he says. “Not until tomorrow, after the procedure. And it is getting late. Neither you nor I have slept well in several nights.”

Jim nods his resignation, but he can’t concede entirely. “Stay with me,” he says, holding out a hand. “Maybe it’ll help me sleep.”

Hesitating only for a moment, the Ambassador takes it, and leads Jim down the hall toward his bedroom.

Jim feels a new spark of nervous energy as they change, backs turned to each other. They’ve been in close quarters for the past three weeks, but now, there’s a new context, an implication to the act of undressing for bed, a thrilling anticipation that dissolves into complete and utter familiarity as they settle in, Jim curled comfortably into the crook of the Ambassador’s arm. The sleeplessness he’s felt for over a week slips away, and finally, he falls into a long and dreamless sleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I was in a live production of Rocky Horror that ate my life for the past two months. Sorry about that. But at least this chapter is extra-long and has a little bit of resolution? Next time, Vulcan magic/science and probably some feels.
> 
> Tel-hassu: literally, bond-doctor. A specialist in bonding and bonding disorders. Yet another word I constructed myself, because the Vulcan dictionary has a word for "removal of the clitoris" but not for something that should, logically (hur), exist in Vulcan medicine.


	6. Restoration (I)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all, this chapter got way longer than I intended (currently 9,000 words and counting in its original form), but there's no good place to split it into multiple chapters, so I'm breaking it into more manageable parts for easier reading and my own sanity. I'll post the parts as their own individual chapters as I complete them.
> 
> Secondly, this is where I really break with canon, because we're getting into TOS (you'll see why below), and there's just more there to juggle. So I'm fudging the timeline - mostly around TMP, because it was supposed to be about 3 years later, but the actors aged 10 years, and I think that's silly. Everything else is falling about where it should.
> 
> Thirdly, on a semi-related note: one thing I'm messing with (read: fixing) may get squicky for some on two levels. I hate the Saavik/Spock relationship in the extended canon, and I'm wiping it out of existence in favor of Saavik and Valeris being Jim and Spock's daughters. I think the way I'm addressing canonical things in regard to that change works really well, but if you've internalized Spock/Saavik as a Thing That Happened, read cautiously. Also, mpreg -- it's not a focus, and it's not graphic, but it's there. If that's a total dealbreaker, you may want to sit out the flashbacks and come back for the chapter titled "Singularity".

When the Ambassador wakes him to go to the tel-hassu, Jim is disoriented, his head pounding. He’d give anything to sleep a little longer, but they have an appointment to keep. A cab picks them up -- a little self-piloting two-seater -- and Jim dozes off against the window just after it takes off from the house. Their destination is clear across the colony, so he gets another forty minutes of light sleep before the cab lands in front of the sprawling temple built into a cliff’s face. Still dazed and drowsy, he thinks, _It really must be bad if they’re sending me to a priest._ Deep drums and tremulous bells somewhere in the distance remind him of something he can’t place as the Ambassador guides him up the path, his heart beating a frantic rhythm.

They enter a cloister supported by intricate columns and arches carved from the living rock. Here and there, white-robed figures emerge from the tall doorways along the length of the passage. It’s an ethereal scene that does nothing to assuage Jim’s fears about the severity of his condition. The Ambassador seems to pick up on his uneasiness, and wraps his arm more tightly around him, taking more of Jim’s weight onto his own frame as they follow the path to a door set apart from the rest.

Through it, several Vulcans sit in meditation, most of them in simple white shifts. Two of them, both elderly women, joined by the barest contact of index and middle fingers, sit apart in grander attire. The older of the two is decked in shimmering golds, blues and purples, heavy silks and feather-light translucent gauze, her hair impeccably braided and adorned. Jim realizes he knows her face. T’Pau. She’s almost a legend in the Federation -- the only person to ever turn down a seat on the council. The other woman, certainly the tel-hassu, is less familiar but equally intimidating; robed and veiled in red, with a stiff white tabbard and gold circlet set with two large crystaline prisms.

“Spock,” T’Pau nods as they cross the threshold, returning his salute. She speaks with regal surety, in what Jim can now tell is Vulcan, albeit heavily accented and in an ancient dialect, which filters through to Jim’s mind with strange syntax. “And are thee James Kirk?”

“Yes, ma’am,” Jim replies.

“I am T’Pau, and she who is my wife is called T’Lar.” Here, she gestured to the tel-hassu. “I will examine thee and thy bond so that it may be known if severance or restoration be lawfully allowed.”

Following Ambassador Spock’s lead, Jim kneels before T’Pau’s chair and submits to the examination. The matriarch’s hands flit over both their cheeks, rough fingers finding their marks in a rush of tingling electricity. As Jim closes his eyes, it feels as if those fingers are somehow penetrating below the skin, burying themselves deep and probing straight through tissue and thought, skating along razor-fine threads between himself and the Ambassador. After long seconds, she draws back.

“Thee are legally and willingly bound in marriage, but Kirk suffers the tel-khreya, the trauma of the bonding. The afflicted must make the choice to release thee, Spock, or to be reunified with thee. Kirk, what is thy choice?”

Glancing briefly at the Ambassador, Jim says, “Restoration, ma’am.”

“Thy choice is willing and uncoerced?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Thee understands the bond is of marriage, and cannot be released without just and lawful cause, so long as thee live?”

“Yes.”

“And thee accepts the risk to thy person of both ritual and bonding?”

“I do.”

She licks her thin lips, hard eyes never faltering from Jim’s, as if searching out the smallest hint of dishonesty. Finally, she blinks. “So be it,” she says. “The restoration shall be done.”

In the silence that follows, two of the lesser priestesses lead them to two tables the others have brought to the center of the room, a short distance apart, and gesture for them to lie down. T’Lar stands from her meditation, and stops at their heads.

“Touch hands,” she says. Her voice is lower than T’Pau’s, more melodic and lacking any discernable accent. “Because your bond is both lawful and consensual, and because you understand the danger to your life, we will use all our power to grant Spock’s request of restoration.”

The priestesses gather around the tables, fingers pressed lightly to the stone, and T’Lar’s hands, much warmer and softer than her wife’s, splay first across the Ambassador’s face, then Jim’s. Finally breaking their silence, the priestesses begin a chant, too quick and low for Jim to catch the words. His dizziness pitches to a peak, and the room fades into vast whiteness until he is no longer aware even of himself. Only a voice, his own. Far away, but growing closer.

 

_Do you play chess, Mr. Spock?_

The question is an invitation to parlay, an offer of truce after weeks of alternating hot contention and cold formality. Jim’s arrival upon the Enterprise has upset the natural order of things, he knows that. It can’t be easy for a singular alien to build a rapport with his crewmates, let alone to see that crew move on, remain aboard, and welcome a new commanding officer, a man he has little respect for, and whom he holds a grudge against from their academy days. To be fair, Jim hasn’t exactly been a model of decorum. It’s an open secret that Spock irritates him, that he’s still disgruntled at Gary getting passed over for first officer while the Vulcan does dual duty. But it’s bad for morale; effective command requires unity, and besides, their rivalry is breeding some frankly specist sentiments among certain segments of the crew. With four more months of mission-prep and five years in deep-space ahead of them, it’s high time, he realizes, that he swallow his pride and extend the olive branch.

So Jim takes a gamble and invites him to sit down at the board. They play. Jim loses the first game, but makes a careful study of his first officer’s playing style. He throws all his effort into confounding the Commander’s logic, and wins the second. As soon as he’s called _checkmate,_ he’s sure he’s blown it. Spock seems downright annoyed. Before Jim can redirect the mood, they’re called to the bridge. He’s made things worse, and he curses himself for it all day.

He’s doing just that, when the Commander’s voice startles him from behind.

“Captain. If you are not otherwise engaged, I’d like to continue our match.”

 

_Your move, Captain._

_We should have intercepted by now. The bridge said they’d call._

_I’ll have you checkmated your next move._

Many matches later, Spock is protective of his time at the board with Jim. Something in him lights up when he’s there. He becomes almost playful, arrogant barbs slowly turning to toothless banter as mission prep comes to a close and the weeks of the mission proper stretch on. Jim himself has a healthy appreciation of others’ attentions, and the Commander’s attentions are an especially rare commodity. As the voyage ticks by, he finds himself forgetting why he ever disliked his first officer. After six months, their rapport has made a complete turn-around from the cold professionalism of Jim’s first days on the Enterprise, and even Spock’s most frustrating traits have become endearing. More incredibly still, they’re on first-name terms, though that really applies only to Jim; Vulcans seem to keep their family-names close to the chest. Never on the bridge, but more and more often in the officer’s lounge or in their shared ready-room, even sometimes when they’re on the away team together, Spock lets the name _Jim_ slip past his lips.

 

_Mr. Spock, why don’t you and I take a walk? At the rate they’re going, we’re going to want to have an alibi._

For the mission’s anniversary, the crew takes leave at a Starbase with an appropriate docking facility, and for once, Spock doesn’t have an excuse to stay aboard. There’s a party, of course, but as much a social creature as Jim is, festivities and celebrations were never much his forte, and, Spock being similarly disinterested, they end up walking a ways off from the base, admiring the lush plantlife. The air is thick with the scent of recent rain and the heavy perfume of the huge purple flowers growing alongside the path. Spock is an uncommonly private man, but he seems more than happy to listen to Jim’s stories about his childhood, his family, camping trips and long hikes in similar locales; he even asks questions, and it’s incredibly refreshing to be able to tell Spock something he doesn’t already know. Jim is in the middle of trying to explain what a moose is with the proper balance of awe and terror when he stops abruptly as they round a bend and emerge on a cliffside, the dusky sky suddenly appearing as the trees thin out, the planet’s triple moons on full display.

“Oh,” he gasps, “would you look at _that_?”

“Quite beautiful,” Spock remarks, joining him at the guardrail.

Jim shoots him a sly glance. “Beautiful? I didn’t think that was in your vocabulary.”

“Then you underestimate my vocabulary,” he says, turning fully. Something about the tone of his voice commands Jim’s attention. “Beauty,” he continues, “is universally appreciated.”

“So it is,” Jim says softly. In a year, he hasn’t quite managed to unravel the subtle expressions and minute changes in tone that expose the man’s true thoughts without straying far from cold impassibility, but his nearness and the softness around his mouth and eyes communicate his meaning with absolute clarity.

It doesn’t even feel like a gamble to kiss him -- just a slow graze of their lips, careful enough to give him the chance to back out, but to Jim’s delight, he doesn’t. Instead, he coils an arm around Jim’s waist, pulling him close and returning the kiss with greater force. Spock’s skin feels feverish, even through his uniform, and he’s almost vibrating with the electric tension between them. By the time they break away, Jim is breathless and dazed, staring dumbstruck at the Commander.

They fumble over simultaneous apologies until Jim can gather himself enough to say, “We ought to get back to the base.”

Afterwards, they seem to reach a silent agreement to put that singular kiss behind them, just a moment of indiscretion between lonely men. No need for it to happen again once they’re back onboard their ship with the distraction of their duties, and no need to let that one incident color their interactions. But it was never going to be that simple; there’s a spark in every casual touch now, or maybe there always was, and now it’s just more apparent to them.

 

_Oh, Captain! Got a minute?_

_A minute._

_It’s Spock. Have you noticed anything strange about him?_

It’s no surprise to Jim when Spock suddenly withdraws. Their interactions had edged toward the suggestive for weeks, and another indiscretion had seemed inevitable. As much as Jim wishes things were less complicated between them, he knows that he needs to allow Spock the distance. It’s easier on his own bruised ego, anyway, to let the Commander have his space.

As Spock’s isolation and agitation grow, however, it becomes obvious enough that McCoy notices and asks Jim about it. It feels wrong to lie to Bones, but this isn’t entirely his secret to tell, so he makes an excuse about “one of Mr. Spock’s contemplative phases,” desperate to get off the topic.

Before long, Jim realizes that the volatility, the anger, the disinterest in food, the distraction -- they just don’t make any sense. It doesn’t seem possible for Spock to be so rattled by what happened between them. So, between McCoy and himself, they needle an explanation out of him: _pon farr_ , the girl waiting for him on Vulcan, the ritual. Ordinarily, Jim would be jealous, but Spock seems to treat the whole ordeal with such disdain and horror that he can only feel sorry for him.

After giving the final order to go to Vulcan, Jim turns the bridge over to Sulu and spends the better part of the next several days with Spock in his quarters, talking, when he’s lucid, about what will happen when they beam down, and when he’s not, comforting him and steadying his shaking hands, making sure he at least eats and drinks a little.

It’s in one of Spock’s bouts of manic delirium that he tugs at Jim’s sleeve, paws at him, chants his name, slurs half-coherent confessions, quietly begging Jim to help him ease the pain as he wrenches him down by the arm with a bruising grip.

Jim knows that, even in his current state, Spock could easily overpower him, so he doesn’t fight back or flinch away, just places a hand over Spock’s, ignoring the palpable shiver it sends through his already-trembling body.

“You know I can’t,” he says gently. “Not when you’re like this. And anyway,” he adds, a little more sadly than he intended, “in a few hours, this’ll all be over with, and you’ll be a married man.”

Spock’s grip loosens, and then he releases Jim entirely, falling back onto his pillow with a ragged sigh. “Yes,” he murmurs. “Yes, of course. Captain, I apologize for my--”

“Don’t.”

 

When they’re less than an hour from Vulcan, Jim helps Spock clean himself up and pull himself together. He gives a show of control and dignity to the crew, but Jim can see the madness Spock displayed in his quarters, barely restrained just beneath the facade.

Then, beaming down to the planet’s surface. The unforgiving wind and parched, scorching air that never seems to fill his lungs all the way. Drums and bells echoing off the rocks. T’Pring’s challenge, and her choice that Jim should be her champion. It crosses his mind to fight to win, just to spite the whole barbaric affair, but with the too-late revelation that the fight is to the death, that’s not an option, even if he could manage to get the upper hand. Then, the combat. Burning in his chest as the blade catches him, cutting deep. Muscles burning after only a few minutes. Bruises and scrapes as he’s thrown to the ground, coarse sand tearing into skin.

At the call of _kroykah,_ his mind racing as he tries to come up with some solution. Maybe if he can knock Spock out, and then refuse to kill him? What could be done, then, if Jim were unwilling to kill and Spock unable? They very well might _both_ die. But he has to try.

The second round starts, and the hypospray McCoy gave him does little to ease his breathing. He’s exhausted, but the combat is even more intense now, and closer. Resisting futilely against powerful hands. Hot coals inches from his back, and the _ahn-woon_ wound tightly about his throat. He manages to flip Spock away from the fire, but it doesn’t break his grip, doesn’t even loosen it.

It seems useless to fight anymore. Spock is too strong, too consumed by the _plaktau_ to show the slightest hesitation or mercy, and Jim’s limbs are heavy, his head swimming, white flurries eating away at the edge of his vision. As the last of his resistance gives out, he can only think how unfair this is. A month ago, he thought things might go differently; maybe they could get past the awkwardness of that night on the Starbase, past the taboo of a romance between men of different species, past the danger to their careers from fraternization. Spend the rest of their lives in each other’s easy company. He wishes he’d given in to Spock’s plea back on the ship. Even if it hadn’t cured him, at least it might have made death easier to swallow.

It’s too late for any of that now. Jim can feel it. At the very least, he wants to tell Spock that he loved him, but the words come out a hoarse gasp. He settles for touching his hand to Spock’s where it grips the weapon. Vulcans are touch-telepaths, aren’t they? Maybe he’ll hear it.

 _I love you,_ he thinks as his vision fades. _I’m not sure when it started; I just know I’ve never been happier than I was on that ship with you. I don’t want to die, but this isn’t your fault. I love you. I love you. I…_

 

_I love you._

Spock’s voice, echoing through his thoughts, suddenly lucid and utterly devastated. It reverberates off the walls of his mind until he wakes back on the ship in sickbay, relieved he survived the ordeal, but a little confused as to how. When McCoy explains what he did, Jim makes a mental note to recommend him for a commendation.

Within minutes, Spock beams aboard. When he sees Jim alive, the mask slips away, and his joy is so palpable, it’s almost as if Jim himself can feel it. They mean to go to the bridge, but they never make it there. Jim gives Sulu the heading over the com from Spock’s quarters, claiming they both need a rest after their ordeal, which isn’t entirely untrue.

 

Hours later, they’re still wrapped around each other, warm and content. Jim can’t keep the grin off his face or the amazement out of his eyes. He’s never felt so connected to anyone, so perfectly in sync. It feels like a veil has lifted, and suddenly, he can understand Spock’s every want and need as easily as if they were his own. Eventually, though, the afterglow fades, and Spock shifts, on his face, the conflicted look of a man with a guilty conscience.

“Something wrong?” Jim asks, propping himself up on one elbow and gazing up at Spock with searching eyes.

“It occurs to me,” he says, “that you do not understand our situation.”

Jim smiles, trailing a hand along Spock’s belly. “What’s there to understand? You mean fraternization? To hell with it. I won’t tell if you won’t.”

“No.” He pulls himself upright before continuing, “It is a somewhat difficult concept, but you deserve to know.”

“Alright, explain.”

Spock takes an uncertain breath. “The _plaktau_ was not broken by the combat. In the moments before you appeared to die, your mind reached out to mine. I responded, and joined my mind to yours. It was our connection that ended it.”

“Is that all?” Jim says, relieved. “Doesn’t seem all that serious.”

“Certainly you’ve noticed that our minds are still locked?”

Jim considers it. “I suppose I did. You’ve seemed...easier to read since we got back. What’s it mean?”

“It is never to be done without the express consent of both parties,” Spock says. “However, I assumed there was no hope of saving your life, and therefore, did not think it would cause you any harm.”

“Will it? Since I’m not dead?”

Swallowing thickly, Spock reluctantly continues, “That is sometimes a concern. Humans normally tolerate bonding with a Vulcan very poorly, neurologically speaking. There are exceptions to that, however, and you appear to be one. But, Jim...” he trails off, and Jim would swear he can feel the shame knotting in Spock’s throat before he finds his voice again. “Among my people, such a bond, even formed without ceremony, would be considered a legal marriage.”

Blinking, Jim sits up to look Spock in the eye. “You...thought I was dying,” he says evenly, “so you figured you might as well _marry_ me?”

“I _am_ sorry. Had I known--”

“Spock,” Jim says, taking his hand. “I’m not upset. Sure, it’s moving a little fast,” he continues, a smile teasing at the corners of his mouth. “But it’s sort of romantic, isn’t it?”

“Romantic?” Spock asks, looking at him skeptically.

Lacing their fingers together, he presses a kiss into the back of Spock’s hand. “I’m serious,” he says. “Both of us were in mortal peril, Bones helped me fake my own death, we _eloped,_ and you left your cheating bride at the altar. It sounds like one of those novels Sulu likes.”

And Spock actually _laughs_ at that -- a short, reedy laugh that sounds entirely foreign on him -- and Jim is so delighted that he can’t help but laugh with him, not the low chuckle he uses when the crew exchanges barbs on the bridge, but the genuine, loud, high laugh that’s always made him feel self-conscious, and for once, he’s not the least ashamed of it.

 

After a long discussion, they agree to keep things casual. It seems sensible enough at the time; even though they’re technically married, the ship leaves very little room for either of them to carry on a serious relationship, and with Jim tending to skate on thin ice with Starfleet regulation in the first place, the less risk they take with their careers, the better. Not much changes between them, aside from their newfound ability to communicate without speaking -- which doesn’t go entirely unnoticed by the crew -- and the fact that, when the rare opportunity arises, they’ll steal off to one or the other’s quarters and sleep together -- which, thankfully, does.

Six months later, Spock requests leave to go home and take care of his mother, who is apparently seriously ill, and, feeling how anxious and withdrawn Spock is, Jim approves the leave without a second thought. They drop him off at the earliest opportunity, just over two weeks after he makes the request, and Sulu and Scotty do double-duty as Science Officer and First Officer, respectively.

“I hope he’s not gone long,” Jim remarks to McCoy over lunch after seeing Spock off. “I might actually start to miss him.”

“Jim, I wouldn’t count on it,” says McCoy.

“Why? You know something I don’t? Did he tell you what his mother’s come down with? Is it serious?”

McCoy blanches, but recovers quickly. “Uh, yeah,” he says. “Pretty bad.”

Jim never does manage to get an explanation out of him.

Four long, uneasy months pass. Spock returns, looking pale and exhausted. He doesn’t seem to want to talk about his leave, but he assures Jim that Amanda made a full recovery, and is in good health.

There’s a crack in their relationship after that, sometimes widened by Spock’s secretiveness and detachment or Jim’s habit of always pushing for _more,_ sometimes narrowed by their unwavering trust in one another or, in spite of the vast differences between them, how alike they are. But it never heals entirely, not in the remaining three years of the mission, nor in the time after. It _does_ become easier to overlook as the years pass and their bond deepens, everything they are to one another far outweighing the things they’re not.


	7. Restoration (II)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warnings: Mentions of mpreg begin here. I'm not gonna lie, this is a grim chapter, but hopefully it ends on a happy enough note to compensate. The remaining parts of "Restoration" assume passing familiarity with the TOS movies, but it's not required.

Nearly three years after the mission, their assignments are closer to home, mostly supervising cadet flights and ferrying diplomats. They share an apartment a short commute from Starfleet Headquarters in San Francisco. Even though they can’t be open about their relationship at work, their friends have all known for years, and like the loyal crew and family that they are, they keep tight-lipped if anyone should ask.

Sulu’s Christmas card that year shows him and Ben with a lanky pre-teen between them, and in her lap, a new addition to the family -- a bright eyed little girl with a bow in her hair. Jim is smiling at the picture when Spock touches his shoulder.

“I was under the impression that you did not want children,” he says, “But your current emotional state suggests otherwise.”

“I-” Jim starts, sitting down at the kitchen counter with a sigh. Spock’s touched a nerve, and Jim knows he needs to be honest. “That’s a complicated question. I should have told you a long time ago. It just never seemed important, but…” When he works up the nerve to say the words, they spill out of him in a flood. “I _do_ have a son. David. He’s...fifteen? I haven’t seen him since he was five or six. His mother...she didn’t even tell me he was mine. When I did the math and found out, she asked me to stay away. Said we were ‘from different worlds.’ That’s code for, ‘You’d be a terrible parent,’ by the way, and...I don’t know. Maybe she was right.”

Spock looks stricken. At first, Jim assumes it’s a reaction to his own emotional display, and feels guilty for dredging it up, but Spock says, “Jim. I am sorry. So _very_ sorry…”

 

What follows is a discussion that ruins all their plans for the day. It’s a lot for Jim to wrap his head around, but by the end, he can pull together all the threads of explanations and backtracking into a cohesive picture:

Vulcans have five distinct biological sexes, _sasu_ and _kosu,_ male and female almost entirely analogous to human sexual dimorphism; _kosasu_ and _sakosu,_ two sexes with typically male and female external appearance, respectively, but with the ability to both impregnate others and carry children; and _ta’raf,_ a neutral sex, incapable of any mode of reproduction, functioning similarly to worker bees in Vulcan society.

Spock is _kosasu,_ and they bonded and slept together in the fertile period after his _pon farr._ When he realized he was pregnant, he hid it, and when it started to become obvious, he took his leave on Vulcan. He never said outright that his mother was ill, but Jim’s assumption made for a convenient excuse. He weighed the situation against all the conversations they’d had about risk to their careers and taking things slowly and not settling down until the time was right, and he decided that telling Jim would only burden him unnecessarily. Spock’s parents agreed to raise his daughter, and he called and visited at every opportunity -- a common arrangement, he assures Jim, for children whose parents have off-world careers.

Jim listens to the whole story, and then yells like he’s never yelled at anyone in his life. He rants and raves, calls Spock every horrible name he can think of. He curses Amanda and Sarek for their part in keeping his daughter away from him. And Bones! Bones _knew,_ he had to know, and he looked Jim right in the face and lied about it. After what happened with Carol, how could he even think of keeping Jim in the dark? -- and Spock protests that he had to _beg_ McCoy not to tell him, and even when he finally agreed, he swore he’d never forgive Spock, but it falls on deaf ears as Jim paces the floor, drives his fist into the wall, leaving a jagged dent in the drywall, and when his voice is hoarse and he’s exhausted, not an ounce of strength left to stay angry, he crumples to the floor, buries his face in his hands, and cries in huge, wracking sobs, only worsened by guilt when Spock touches him, and he can feel all his years of anguish from keeping the secret, certain until an hour ago that it was the right thing to do, and his regret and misery at being wrong.

The storm passes; they stay on the floor, silent, until Jim can bring himself to say, “I want to know her name.”

“Saavik,” Spock says.

Wiping his face on his sleeve, Jim asks, “What’s it mean?”

“‘From the Well-War’.”

“ _What_?”

“Water is very scarce on Vulcan,” Spock explains. “In the past, clans would fight for possession of wells. To ‘have a well-war’ became an expression meaning to struggle for something valuable -- usually a mate. Since she was conceived after--”

“Spock,” Jim interrupts, “that’s _terrible._ It makes it sound like she’s some sort of... _consolation prize_ from your failed engagement.”

“...That was not my intent.”

Laughing, Jim presses his face into Spock’s shoulder. “Next time,” he says, “I’m picking the name.”

As soon as he says it, he knows there will be a “next time”. The rift between them is wider than ever, but in spite of everything, he can’t hate Spock, and he can’t stay angry. He has a daughter, a little girl he’s never met. But he _will_ meet her soon, and they’re going to raise her together. What’s more, this is his chance to prove Carol wrong. He and Spock really _are_ from different worlds, and he’s going to make sure that it never means anything but that his daughter has a breadth of experiences and opportunities.

 

Before they can plan a trip to Vulcan, Spock’s second _pon farr_ puts everything on hold. They take medical leave, and luckily enough, there’s a nasty flu going around that can serve as an excuse. Their bond means that, unlike the first time, Jim experiences it with Spock. Fortunately, they’re together from the onset, so the symptoms aren’t as severe, and once they’re in seclusion, the territorial aspects fade.

For the first five days, they can’t bear to go even a second without skin contact; they’re so immersed in the bond that to do so feels like cutting off a limb -- their thoughts, their entire sense of self so utterly unified that they become, for all intents and purposes, one being. Sex between them has always been intensely intimate, but in that state, it’s unreal; they move together, in perfect synchronization, through each fitful, desperate peak of ecstasy, and through the intervening restful valleys, when they press together as if their bodies might finally fuse, and kiss, deep and slow, until another wave of furious need swells at their core. They don’t sleep, but each night for an hour or two, they fall into a period of meditative rest, exchanging thought and memory, unaware of anything outside themselves. After these interludes, they have only a few brief moments of satiation and lucidity to clean themselves and drink a little water.

Beyond the sixth day, the urgency tapers off, and more of their time is spent at rest, no longer overwhelmed by passion, but still awash in their bond, their love, and their vows. They can part for short intervals without much discomfort. Speaking aloud is easier, though still not necessary. The fog slowly clears.

When it’s over, even Spock is starving, sore, and exhausted. In the shower, they check over each other’s bodies for injuries -- a patchwork of different-aged bruises on them both, and a little bleeding on Jim’s part, but nothing more serious -- and then they sit in bed and eat several days’ worth of food before falling asleep.

 

They arrange for their cadets to take a test-flight and cultural-enrichment trip to Vulcan. As a pretense, it works well enough -- a little out of the ordinary, but not entirely unprecedented, and the cadets seem thrilled to have a month of real, uninterrupted experience on a starship. After fourteen days, they arrive on schedule. Sulu and Uhura supervise the first group of cadets on their excursion while Scotty and the remaining cadets mind the ship, leaving Jim and Spock free to beam down to Spock’s family home.

Sarek and Amanda greet them at the gate, between them, a little girl with pointed ears, but rounded brows. Her eyes are dark and serious, but her hair is as chestnut-brown and curly as Jim’s would be if he ever left it as nature intended. He decides that, after this, he will.

For two weeks, he’s tempered his expectations -- after all, he’s a stranger to Saavik. She can’t be expected to warm up to him right away. He hangs back, lets Spock go ahead of him, and watches as they exchange salutes and Spock kneels to talk to her.

“I see you’ve learned the _ta’al_ ,” he says, in gentle tones Jim hasn’t heard in his voice before. He’s never sounded so lovely.

“Yes,” Saavik replies with grave sincerity. “It was very difficult for me, but I was able to learn with practice.”

Just as Spock is saying, “Well done,” she looks past him, to where Jim is standing, her attention visibly broken.

“ _A’ni!_ ” she gasps, running to him, and thanks to his bond with Spock, he unmistakably hears, _father._

“Saavik,” Sarek calls. There’s a warning edge in his voice, stopping her a few paces short of Jim. She looks back over her shoulder, but Amanda throws Sarek a glance so icy it freezes whatever reproach he had prepared in his throat. He simply nods his resignation and gestures for her to go on.

Jim swallows thickly, suddenly terrified. He has no idea what to say to her, or what to do. He’s never been great with kids, and as much as he loves the idea of having a family, when the moment comes to meet his daughter, he’s overwhelmed with doubt.

He decides to err on the side of caution and, barely able to keep his voice from breaking, asks, “Is it alright if I hug you?”

“That is acceptable,” she says, and Jim can’t help himself. He scoops her up under the arms and spins her around in the air before holding her tightly to his chest.

He’s had seven years to grow accustomed to his bond with Spock, but the moment he touches Saavik, her thoughts take him by surprise. She’s a little perplexed by him, but thrilled by his strangeness, and she’s happy. It’s more than he ever could’ve asked for.

 

_Valerie._

_What?_

_Her name. It’s going to be Valerie._

Saavik comes home with them, and everything settles into an easy rhythm. They spend their time in San Francisco with her, supervising her studies and introducing her to the human part of her heritage. When they’re out on assignment, Winona takes over and spoils her terribly. Jim suspects long before, but after three months, Spock confirms that they’re expecting a second child. He rejects the name “Valerie” outright, but Jim persists. Eventually, they compromise on a Vulcan name with a similar sound, and, another seven months later, they travel to Vulcan for _Valeris_ to be born.

 

Things start to unravel the moment they arrive home. From the start, Valeris is a difficult child. She cries almost constantly, no matter what they try to soothe her, and it goes on for so long that even Spock’s considerable patience is frayed. There’s nothing physically wrong with her, but she doesn’t sleep through the night until she’s eighteen months old. Even then, she’s fussy, sensitive, and heavily dependent.

Jim feels helpless. It’s not just him it’s difficult on; Saavik is worn down and overstimulated from her sister’s fits, and she’s not getting the attention she deserves from either of her parents. Their strategy of divide-and-conquer -- one of them spending time with Saavik while the other tends to Valeris -- means that they see very little of one another outside of work.

To add fuel to the fire, someone at Starfleet Command knows about their family. Pressure mounts on Jim from above to take a promotion and ground-assignment. No one ever says the word “fraternization” aloud; it’s Starfleet’s reputation as much as Jim’s. But the implication is there in subtle prods of, _It really would be better for you to take this offer while it’s still on the table._ He gets a call from Uhura first, and then similar ones -- everyone that worked closely with either of them in the past decade and knows, and some who they thought didn’t. Starfleet is digging for impropriety, and someone, somewhere is bound to crack.

In the end, it’s better for his family to take the promotion, so he yields and becomes Admiral Kirk, chained to a desk handing out orders to the people doing the real work. He consoles himself by thinking of the time he’ll have with his family, and as soon as the heat is off them, Spock requests transfer and instructs at the Academy full-time.

 

_Christ, Spock, you sound like your father. She didn’t mean any harm -- she’s worried about you. You know ‘worry’? One of those ‘human emotions’ you hate so much? You can’t just ask her not to have them._

They’re miserable, and it’s getting hard to hide it from the girls the more they grow. Saavik is eleven, curious and perceptive, when she abruptly asks Spock why he’s so sad. It rattles him. He shuts down, chastises her for asking an invasive question. Jim explodes at him for it. They fight, their bond an echo-chamber of anger and resentment, snowballing between them until Valeris cries for them to stop. It sucks all the fight out of them instantly, turning it to embarrassment and guilt. They comfort her, apologize to both of them, put the argument away, but the damage is done. Valeris is too young to understand, but she’s afraid. Saavik blames herself.

One day, not long after, Jim comes home to an empty house. As the hours tick by with no sign of Spock or the girls, every worst-case scenario plays through in his head. He calls everyone he can think of, but no one’s seen them. He doesn’t sleep, sick with worry and growing sicker every minute his family is gone with no explanation.

When he comes in for his morning briefings, dishevelled and sleep-deprived, he finds Spock’s notice of resignation-effective-immediately, blind-carbon-copied to him. In the letter, Spock states that he’s leaving Starfleet in order to return to Vulcan and undergo the discipline of Kolinahr, citing his own mental wellbeing and that of his family.

 

Jim’s not the same after that. He tries to reach Spock for months, first by conventional means, and then, when those fail, by using their bond, but he receives no answer. Either Spock is intentionally ignoring him, or it doesn’t work. Jim doesn’t know which is worse.

He wants to fight it. If Spock won’t come back, or even speak to him, he at least wants to bring Saavik and Valeris home. He doesn’t even care that it would mean admitting their parentage, and that both of them were conceived while he was Spock’s commanding officer. It’s worth throwing his career away to have them home, but a look into the precedent on interplanetary custody cases reveals that the suit would be decided under Vulcan law, and a look into Vulcan law reveals that he would lose.

For three years, he tries to accept it, tries to move on, waits for things to get better, waits to feel less hollow. Nothing seems to help.

His family is gone. He drinks entirely too much and too often.

His family is gone. He burns through lovers so quickly he picks up a reputation for it. They all feel like mannequins in his hands -- cold and unfeeling. After a while, he starts to treat them like it; uses them. What does it matter? They’re all using him just the same, for his status, his power. They want to climb the ladder, and he’s just a rung on the way up.

His family is gone. McCoy starts using the term, “passive suicidality,” but Jim doesn’t want to hear it, and eventually, even Bones has had enough. He stops trying to help, and eventually, drifts out of Jim’s life altogether.

His family is gone.

It all builds, so slowly he never notices that he’s losing his grip, to a complete nervous breakdown.

He takes some time off, gets himself together, forces himself to really _look_ at all the ugliness of the last few years, how he’s allowed himself to live. Faces the harsh reality that Jim Kirk at thirty-five would have really _hated_ Jim Kirk at forty-five. He gets it into his head that all he needs to put his life back on track is to be _out there_ again. A starship. A crew. Bigger problems than his own. Real perspective.

He gets the call -- a mysterious cloud, immense and destructive, headed toward Earth -- and sees his chance. He gets his crisis to tackle.

He wishes he had Spock to tackle it with him. He even reaches out, and for a moment, feels like he might’ve gotten through to him, but he gets nothing in return. It’s easier to accept now than before, easier to think that somehow, he can find someone to stand in for everything that Spock was to him.

He gets his ship, and with it, his crew. He needs Bones. He knows that. McCoy will keep him from justifying the very same tactics that bring him aboard. He needs someone to be his conscience, until he can find it again. So he calls in a favor and gets McCoy’s commission reactivated. Then everything is in place, as much like it was before as possible. Deep down, he knows it’s not a solution. It’s a distraction. But he feels better than he has in years.

 

_I have been monitoring your communications with Starfleet Command, Captain._

Suddenly, there’s a shuttle requesting to dock, a courier of some sort, and a few minutes after they receive it, Spock walks onto the bridge. For a second, Jim thinks he’s dreaming, but it’s quickly apparent that, if he is, it’s a nightmare. Spock is frigid, closed off. It’s like he’s hollowed himself out and replaced everything with wires and circuits.

It’s bullshit.

Jim knows it is, because he knows the travel time from Vulcan, and how fast those long-range shuttles can fly. Spock left Vulcan before the _Enterprise_ launched. He heard him, and he came.

At first, Jim struggles to speak and listen while asking Spock his silent question, but the ability comes back to him quickly, and he doesn’t stop repeating it.

_Where are they?_

“I am aware of your engine design difficulties.”

_Where are they?_

“I offer my services as Science Officer...”

_Where are they?_

“...with all due respect, Commander.”

_Where are they?_

“Captain, with your permission, I will now discuss these fuel equations with the Engineer.”

 _Don’t turn your back--_ “Mr. Spock?” _\--on me. Where--_ “Welcome aboard.” _\--are they?!_

 

_With Sarek and Amanda._

The answer comes after Jim and McCoy’s attempt at an intervention. For a split second, Spock’s control slips, and Jim hears it as plain as if he’d said it aloud. With the thought, anguish. Shame. Fear.

Less than an hour ago, if he’d asked himself if he wanted to see Spock in pain, he would’ve said yes -- he deserved it, didn’t he? After he turned tail and ran, took his daughters from him without a word, then showed up here expecting a free pass to be not just cold, but _cruel,_ to the very people who were supposed to be his friends? But the reality doesn’t feel as poetically just as the hypothetical. Jim still can’t even begin to fathom the reason Spock left, but whatever it was, he felt it was important enough to jettison his career, his husband, everyone he’d spent the majority of his adult life building relationships with, and tear his daughters away from half their family and all their friends. And after all that, he failed.

Jim can understand why he’s wound up so tightly; it feels like if he loses his grip for even a moment, he might break into a million pieces.

 

From there, the mission is a blur. Intercepting the entity, Vejur, a living machine searching for its creator. Watching in horror as it absorbs Lieutenant Ilia, and sends back a probe in her likeness. Its threat to eliminate what it views as a “carbon-unit infestation” onboard the _Enterprise_ and, soon, on Earth. Spock’s rash decision to take a spacewalk into its brain. Bringing him back, unconscious and barely alive.

Chapel and McCoy manage to stabilize him. Jim and McCoy are looking over his scans when he hears it. A laugh. _Spock’s_ laugh, low and reedy and beautiful. Only Jim hears it, but it turns his head toward Spock, still staring vacantly at the ceiling, and the rest of the room follows.

Within seconds, Spock comes out of his trance. He’s weak, but he’s talking, _laughing._ He’s expressive and open, and when he reaches for Jim’s arm, a firm squeeze of his bicep, they connect.

A tentative, _May I?_

“Jim…”

And the response, a resounding, _Yes!_

They clasp hands, in front of a room full of witnesses, and Spock feels no shame. Only the consuming love and relief that washes over them both.

“This...simple feeling,” says Spock, “is beyond Vejur’s comprehension.”

Jim’s eyes well up as he presses his other hand to the back of Spock’s, nodding his understanding. Everything is forgiven, as long as they can get out of this mess and bring their girls home. A fresh start, for all of them.

That exchange in sickbay feels like a renewal of their vows, but when the mission’s done, the Earth out of harm’s way, a victory lap taken, and Sarek and Amanda en route to meet them in San Francisco with the girls, they agree that it’s time for something more official. They’ve had a Vulcan wedding. It’s only fitting that they have a human one, as well.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Language note:  
> A'ni: informal of A’nirih - father/mother; sasu or sakosu who begets a child. (informal is my construction; "a'nirih" is one word for "father", but I figured in this system, it would refer to reproductive function rather than gender)


	8. Restoration (III)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Took some liberties with "Generations" because who the fuck is Antonia. Other than that, this chapter is mostly canon compliant and, thankfully, marks the end of the flashbacks.

Jim marches into Admiral Nogura’s office with an official disclosure of their relationship and a list of demands. It’s a bold move, one he couldn’t have made before, but now that the press is painting James T. Kirk as the man who saved the world, there’s very little he could ask for that Starfleet could refuse. Overnight, Starfleet’s rules are quietly rewritten to allow for married couples to serve together, and for immediate civilian family to be boarded on-ship with them, as long as there is no appearance of favoritism or improper conduct. A sizeable crew is given notice to report to prep for a five-year exploration mission aboard the Enterprise in three months’ time, and Jim and Spock take family leave until then.

Sarek doesn’t stay with them long before he has to tend to his duties as Ambassador, but Amanda can do her programming work from anywhere, so she stays to help them with wedding preparations. There’s a lot to plan, and not much time to plan it in before their leave is over, but it’s going to be a small affair -- a few of their old friends from Starfleet, their children, their parents, and other close family members, all gathered at Jim’s family home in Iowa. They arrange travel for everyone who will need it. Their colors -- gold and blue -- are an easy decision. Food is more difficult. They can’t find a caterer who can prepare food suitable for both their families until the very last minute, and even then, they worry that he’ll neglect proper labeling and they’ll end up with a bunch of sick guests. They put that worry to bed with the knowledge that both their best man and maid of honor are physicians.

Everything falls into place, and before they know it, their guests are all arriving in the big field out back, the music plays, and they’re standing in front of each other in their white tuxedos, vests and ties in their colors, Christine at Spock’s side, Bones at Jim’s, Valeris with her basket of flower petals, Saavik in a blue gown looking lovely, if a little too grown up for Jim’s comfort -- a reminder of how overdue this really is, and how much time with her he’s missed.

As they take hands, that familiar shock of perfect unity travelling through every nerve and synapse, Jim is only vaguely aware that his cheeks are damp with free-flowing tears, and that everyone on Spock’s side of the aisle, save Amanda -- who’s beaming -- is looking distinctly uncomfortable with the whole event. He finally sees why Spock insisted they give their vows telepathically.

The officiant’s speech winds down, the gathering silent except for birdsong and a light breeze through the trees.

_You, more than anyone else, know how I have struggled to find my place in the world. The two halves of myself have been at war as far back as I can remember. I felt I was destined to be a strange outsider among both my mother’s and my father’s peoples, unless I could exorcise one half to purify the other. You never accepted that. While others reminded me how I was different from them, you never hesitated to point out my humanity. You encouraged me to be “the best of both worlds” -- advice I wish I could have heeded sooner. I know now that I cannot flee to one extreme in fear of the other. Today, I give you my solemn word that I will never again try to deny what I am, because you have given me an example of the very best of humanity, and a place where I truly belong._

Jim takes a slow, unsteady breath and squeezes Spock’s hands, the pressure he feels in return helping him to sort his thoughts of _beautifulperfectloveyouneedyou_ into something more coherent.

_I wrote something down...but it’s in my pocket, and I’m sure as hell not letting go of you to get it. So I’ll just say that I don’t know what comes after this. I never know. But through everything that’s happened, no matter how unlikely it looked, we’ve always come out on the other side together. Call it random chance or luck...call it a miracle. Whatever you want to call it, it’s how I know that, whatever happens after today, I’ll have you by my side. And since the universe seems to have decided you’re stuck with me...I promise to do everything in my power to deserve the honor of being called your husband, and a father to our daughters._

 

The timing of the wedding is perfect. Almost as soon as they return to San Francisco, both their appetites become greatly diminished, until they’re barely eating at all. It being Jim’s second time, and Spock’s third, the early symptoms of _pon farr_ are easier to recognize. With two weeks left in their leave, they send Saavik and Valeris to stay with Winona and begin their seclusion.

Their wedding gift from Amanda and Sarek -- a very discreet care package for the eminent occasion, containing slow-release vitamin supplements, first aid supplies, matching sets of robes and house shoes soft enough for their oversensitized skin, and a small vial containing an oral contraceptive (with an attached note in Amanda’s handwriting, rushed, as if she included it in secret: _Only if you want to._ ) -- is much appreciated and helpful.

Spock takes the pill. With their mission on the horizon, Jim knows it’s only sensible, though a small part of him wishes the departure could be delayed a year.

They emerge on the other side in better shape than the last time. They had expected their bond to deepen with each cycle, but they hadn’t expected the extent. By the time the mission launches, they’re in constant mental contact, to the point that, when one of them is on the bridge and the other on the away team, communicator failures become irrelevant. Months and years fly by -- Saavik learns the operations of the ship so well that, in the third year, she leaves for early entrance to Starfleet Academy on a double sciences and command track. Valeris and Sulu’s daughter, Demora, grow inseparable, and sometimes, in the quiet journeys between systems, the crew will show them how to operate the various stations on the bridge. By the time Earth welcomes the _Enterprise_ home, Valeris is twelve, Demora, thirteen, and they’re both constantly on Saavik’s heels to let them shadow her or try on her uniform.

The _Enterprise_ is repurposed as a training vessel. One small consolation is that Spock, back at the academy and newly promoted, is given command, Saavik among his cadets. Jim soothes the mild jealousy he feels by making frequent check-ins on them, complicated by Saavik’s terrible poker-face. Jim and Spock have had twenty years to learn the art of masking their affection for one another with careful omission and subtle innuendo, but Saavik hasn’t had such an advantage. When it’s just Spock, she manages to maintain perfect decorum, but something about having _both_ of them there make them her _parents_ instead of commanding officers. She’s terrified that she’ll let an _a’ni_ or a _sa-mi_ slip in front of her classmates. By the time she’s a few months from graduation, she’s more comfortable with the compartmentalization, and if she’s a little stiff when addressing Jim as _Admiral,_ no one outside their personal circle seems to notice.

 

It should have been a simple three-week training mission. It certainly starts that way. Valeris stays with Ben and Demora for the duration, and Jim meets Spock and his cadets on board. In a display just barely toeing the line toward favoritism, Spock lets Saavik pilot them out. As much faith as Jim has in his daughter’s considerable abilities, he has to force himself not to hover, ready to take over if something should go wrong. But she’s not a child anymore; she’s a Starfleet officer-in-training, and she handles the departure beautifully. Jim has to admit that it was a good move on Spock’s part -- sitting in the Captain’s chair seems to bolster her confidence.

Then, the communication from Carol.

Genesis.

The _Reliant,_ commandeered by Khan _._

Jim makes a bad call and their ship is crippled and at the mercy of their attacker. Too many casualties. The stakes, already life-or-death, only get higher when David gets involved. The training cruise becomes an all-out brawl with his dearest friends, his husband, and two of his children on board.

It looks grim, but miraculously, they make it through.

Just as they’re breathing their sigh of relief, a few words bring everything crashing down.

 

_Jim...I think you’d better get down here._

McCoy’s voice. Something’s wrong. He looks to Spock, but finds his station empty. Reaches out to him. Silence.

Running down to engineering. The core chamber. It takes three men to hold him back. Behind the injector assembly, Spock is slumped against the wall when Jim reaches the door. Trying to call out to him, but only managing a whimper. He can hardly tear his eyes away to find the intercom and call his name again. He watches, helpless, as Spock struggles to his feet and straightens his coat by the hem, stumbles toward him. In pain. Blind.

But even blind, Spock knows where Jim is, can feel him -- in spite of the fact that he’s pouring all of his remaining strength into shielding Jim from sharing his agony.

Watching him die.

 

A funeral gives no closure, no finality. Jim is in shock, numb and dazed. Saavik is devastated, and he can’t even pull himself together long enough to comfort her. So David does, and in the process, between them, they work out that they’re half-siblings. David reconciles with Jim. One bright spot in all this ugliness. It heals nothing, but it gives him the strength to build up a delicate facade of _Admiral Kirk, commanding his vessel,_ to cover the broken man beneath.

Sometimes, he gets a fleeting sensation, like a static shock or a chill down his spine, fingers not-quite touching the back of his neck. Phantom pains, the ghosts of their bond. He can’t keep Genesis off his mind. That planet. Life from death.

He fixates on it more and more as the repairs on the _Enterprise_ progress and they limp home. The trainees are reassigned -- Saavik to the planet, with David. He makes them swear to contact him if they find anything. He can’t bring himself to even think what he means by that.

When they disembark, Jim feels truly, utterly alone for the first time in twenty years.

And then McCoy loses his mind. Spock’s death had apparently hit him particularly hard. He breaks into Spock’s sealed quarters, and Jim finds him, confused and disoriented, mumbling about Genesis, Mount Seleya, Vulcan. Jim should have seen it, should have been there for him, but he was too consumed by his own grief to think about how difficult it must have been on everyone else who was down there at the core chamber, especially Bones.

They arrive at Earth, and learn they won’t be returning to Genesis -- it’s quarantined, any information about the project or the planet classified. Even if Saavik and David find that vague “something”, they won’t be able to tell Jim about it -- and the _Enterprise_ is to be decommissioned. It’s insult to already-grave injury.

 

Before they beam down, Sulu asks to speak to Jim in private. He hands him a folded Federation flag, wanted to give it to him after the funeral, but didn’t think the whole crew should see. Jim clutches it to his chest and can’t seem to let it go until they arrive at Sulu’s. Ben has coffee ready when they come through the door, and he hands Jim a cup with a squeeze on the shoulder and a quiet condolence before calling Valeris and Demora down.

When he sees Valeris, Jim breaks down. He can’t tell her, can’t even speak without his breath catching in his throat, but she sees the flag, sees that he’s alone. Gingerly, she sits down next to him on the couch, presses the pads of her fingers to his face just long enough to confirm what she already suspects.

“What’s wrong?” Demora asks as Valeris pulls away from Jim and folds her hands in her lap.

“My father has died,” she says. She doesn’t cry, like Saavik did. Just leans into Demora when she wraps her arms around her and gives a long, unsteady sigh.

 

Valeris asks to stay with the Sulus a while longer, and Jim doesn’t have the heart to tell her no. She needs her friend now, someone who isn’t just as lost as her, to get her through her grief. And Jim needs the same. After he checks in on Bones -- resting at home, heavily tranquilized, but otherwise in good spirits -- he calls the crew over for a drink.

They barely have time to make their somber toast before Sarek arrives and asks to speak to Jim alone. He’s furious, and Jim doesn’t fully understand everything he’s saying, but he tries to sort it out. Sarek thinks that Spock might have transferred his _katra,_ his spirit, into Jim’s body. It’s normally given to a close family member, a spouse or a child, when a Vulcan is dying, to be preserved and interred. Given the potential for Genesis to have mended Spock’s body, it’s possible, even likely, that they could bring him back.

Sarek asks to meld with Jim to find the _katra._ Jim can hardly refuse, but he loathes the longing ache he feels at the connection, ashamed that it soothes him to be united with a mind so similar to Spock’s. Together, they relive the time in the core chamber, and Sarek searches, probing beneath those painful moments, tearing open wounds that have barely even begun to heal. But it’s useless. The _katra_ isn’t there.

Defeated, Sarek almost leaves, but Jim calls out to him to stay. He keeps thinking about McCoy, how strangely he was acting during his breakdown. And then, on the flight recorder’s memory, they find it -- Spock subduing McCoy and melding with him before going into the chamber.

Spock is alive, his body on Genesis, his soul with Bones.

All at once, the paralysis Jim has felt the last few weeks vanishes. He gathers up his crew, makes an attempt at getting permission to go back, and when he doesn’t get it, they get to work. The fact that Bones has been institutionalized is an inconvenience, but a minor one. The well-oiled machine of the _Enterprise_ crew executes their plan, and they’re quickly en route to Genesis.

 

Nothing is ever simple or easy for them, though, and they’re met with a Klingon Bird-of-Prey, its commander intent on getting a Genesis device, Spock, Saavik, and David his hostages on the planet below. They manage to defeat the Klingon complement and escape the unstable planet before it breaks apart, but the cost is catastrophic.

The _Enterprise,_ destroyed, nothing but smoke and fire streaking across the planet’s sky.

And David, killed by the Klingons saving Saavik’s life.

They commandeer the Bird-of-Prey and make it to Vulcan, battered and bloody, Spock hanging on by a thread, and the _fal-tor-pan_ is performed over a tense fourteen hours. McCoy is tired, but unharmed after the ritual. Spock doesn’t fare as well. Physically, he’s fine, but he suffered more neurological damage than Bones. He passes the crew without a hint of recognition.

When Jim reaches out to him, he finds their bond frayed, but intact, and Spock turns, lowering his hood. He looks at each member of the crew in turn, trying to recognize them, or perhaps to find which one of them made the unexpected contact. Finally, he stops in front of Jim.

“My father says that you have been my friend,” he says, his voice soft and tentative. The word _friend_ doesn’t carry the usual color it has when they use it toward one another. “You came back for me.”

“You would’ve done the same for me,” Jim responds, keeping his voice and expression level. If Spock really remembers nothing, there’s no point in pushing him just yet.

“Why would you do this?”

Jim falters, but a suitable answer comes to him. “Because the needs of the one outweighed the needs of the many.”

It sparks something -- just an unsure glimmer of recognition, and then Spock turns to go. He only makes it a few steps before turning back, the forming connections in his brain visible on his face.

“I have been, and ever shall be...your friend,” he says.

“Yes,” says Jim, breathless with hope. “Yes, Spock.”

“The ship! Out of danger?”

“You saved the ship. You saved us all. Don’t you remember?”

Spock swallows and comes closer, studying Jim’s face, brows knitted.

“Jim,” he says, like he’s had a revelation. “Your name is Jim.”

As recognition washes over Spock’s face, Jim can’t hold back a smile.

“Yes.”

He remembers. Not much, but it’s a start. In the following weeks, Jim and McCoy are both expected to participate in his recovery -- it’s slow and gruelling, but he holds onto more every day. Amanda, meanwhile, programs tests to speed up his recall of academic knowledge. In three months, he’s back on his feet, if not exactly at a hundred percent.

The crew decides to return to Earth and face court martial, but Saavik stays behind. The loss of her brother, watching him die in her place, left her shaken. And there was something else, too. As Sarek explained it to Jim, she did exactly what a family member would be expected to do when Spock’s body prematurely reached _pon farr_ on Genesis, guided him in meditation, used her own will to calm the physiological storm, but the level of telepathic connection required was disturbing to her, and not only in that it was a severe violation of both their privacy -- she connected to a mind without a soul, and experienced the unspeakable horror of being only uncomprehending flesh. Unlike Spock, she doesn’t have the luxury of not remembering it. All things considered, she’s had a hell of a first assignment, and she’s more than earned her leave.

 

They come home, in a roundabout way, and their resolution of the ensuing crisis puts them back in Starfleet’s good graces. They get off incredibly lightly for mutineers -- Jim is demoted, but it’s less a slap on the wrist and more a generous gift. He’s placed in command of the newly-christened _Enterprise-A_.

Valeris, taking after her sister, enters Academy early, and their home feels a little empty. The absence of family responsibility gives him too much time to linger on all the things he wishes he could change. He thinks about David a lot.

He soothes his longing for family by spending his leave with Spock and Bones, but it’s not an entirely successful diversion. The new ship’s first crisis comes and goes, and as they continue their interrupted leave, his restlessness only becomes more apparent. McCoy takes him aside and points out that it may not all be due to the events of the last two years weighing on his mind.

“You’ve been eating like a bird the whole time we’ve been out here,” he says with a meaningful look in Spock’s direction.

Jim blinks, realizing the implication. “You think--? No, it’s...it can’t be that. I think those days are over with, Bones.”

“Really?” asks McCoy, a little amusement creeping into his tone. “Now why’s that?”

“Well,” Jim stammers, “we’re both of a certain age, and--” He does a little mental math. “--If it were going to happen again, it should have happened already.”

McCoy looks incredulous, but delighted at Jim’s embarrassment. “‘A certain age’?” he asks. “He’s going to live to be about a hundred and fifty. Besides, he was dead for a month, who knows what his biological clock got reset to.”

Jim is ready to dismiss it as ridiculous, just Bones making a wild speculation, when Spock walks up between them.

“Doctor,” he says, a certain territorial edge to his voice. “I would appreciate being privy to any discussion you may feel necessary to have with my husband.”

McCoy throws Jim a wide-eyed look that communicates his, “I told you so,” with perfect clarity.

Trying to get back to San Francisco in time would be too much of a gamble, and the _Enterprise_ doesn’t afford them enough privacy for their comfort, so while they still have most of their senses about them, they improvise a seclusion shelter in a grotto near the camp, and have the necessities transported down. McCoy grumbles a little about having to spend his remaining leave time keeping watch and checking in on them, but it’s just banter.

This cycle is a rough one -- intense and physically draining, probably because of the damage to their bond after Spock’s death and resurrection -- but it’s also healing and cathartic for both of them. After it’s over, their telepathic rapport is restored to its former depth, perhaps even more than that. They return to the ship with a comfortable closeness, ready to begin face whatever awaits them side-by-side.

 

Six years pass. Saavik gets her first command, and they see her off proudly. The old crew scatters to new endeavors. The idea of retirement finally doesn’t seem so bad. Spock spends some time at his Academy posting to closely mentor Valeris. Compartmentalization comes more easily to her than it ever did to Saavik, and on top of it, she’s sharp. The sensitivity she displayed as a child turns to her distinct advantage; she’s like a sponge, absorbing the lessons Starfleet offers her with ease.

Unfortunately, that characteristic doesn’t just apply to the lessons Starfleet and Spock have to teach her. She’s learned from Jim, too, and not at all the values he meant to impart. Just a few short months after she graduates at the top of her class, assigned to the _Enterprise_ for her parents’ final mission before retirement, a successful career ahead of her, she throws it all away. She’s a traitor, sabotaging the peace effort with the Klingon Empire, ready to sacrifice anyone who stood in the way, even her own father.

And for her justification, she invokes David’s death and repeats all the lessons Jim unwittingly taught her about the Klingons, word-for-word.

With both their testimony, they manage to avoid criminal prosecution for her, but her career is over, and she’s sent to a rehabilitation colony, where she’s expected to remain for a very long time. They try to visit, but she refuses them both.

Years ago, it would have broken them, but even though it’s a grave blow, their long experience tells them that they’re strong enough to weather it. They work through the guilt and grief together and settle comfortably into their retirement, appreciative of the both peace and quiet it affords them. After careful consideration, they decide to have another child -- one they can raise without the distractions of interplanetary crisis. So when the time comes, Spock doesn’t take his pill. This _pon farr_ is a stark contrast to the previous one, and whether it’s their newfound stability or the natural winding down of each successive cycle within a bonded pair, they come out of seclusion less exhausted, and with fewer scrapes and bruises, than any of the previous occassions.

 

_How do I look?_

A year after the _Enterprise-A_ was decommissioned, the _Enterprise-B_ finishes construction, and Starfleet asks them both to be present for its first cruise. Of course, it’s out of the question for Spock, who is heavily pregnant, but Jim agrees. As much as he hates public events and the media involvement that’s sure to feature in the flagship’s maiden voyage, he’s eager to get a look at the new ship. He pulls his uniform out of storage for the occasion. It’s gotten a little tighter in the last year, but it still fits.

At the question, Spock looks up from his reading, sets it aside, and pulls himself to his feet with no small amount of effort -- he never got quite this big with either Saavik or Valeris. He circles Jim, appraising. “Perfect,” he says, a smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

He catches Jim in a kiss. The angle’s a little awkward, but feeling his warmth and the drag of his fingers through his hair, Jim can’t complain. It takes a long minute for him to work up the will to pull away. “I should get going,” he says running a hand over the soft cabling of Spock’s sweater.

Spock concedes with a little nod and a squeeze of his hand.

“I’ll see you later tonight,” Jim says, stealing another, briefer kiss. “Love you.”

“I love you, too, Jim.”

 

That’s the last time he sees Spock. The _Enterprise’s_ cruise is interrupted by a distress signal, and Jim finds himself unofficially pulled out of retirement to rescue two refugee ships from a huge ribbon of temporal energy. He’s at the deflector relay console when the hull bursts. As he’s pulled from the ship, he only has time to direct a single thought, one frantic message home.

_I’m sorry._

 

He blinks, and then he’s on his feet again, not being pulled out of a wounded vessel into space, but standing outside the cabin he used to own. He’s chopping wood for the fireplace. There’s a steaming mug resting on the ground nearby. He lifts it to his face and takes in the distinct, earthy aroma of _theris kov-sayas._

This was the last weekend they stayed there before selling it -- the weekend of his birthday, the day before Saavik was scheduled for the Kobayashi Maru scenario. The last time he, Spock, Saavik, and Valeris were all together before the incident with Khan.

Heaven.

He’s just thinking he could get used to it, when a bald man in a strange jumpsuit walks up the path.

 

He’s reluctant to leave, even after finding out that this whole place, which his visitor calls “the Nexus”, is an illusion, not the peaceful afterlife he’d imagined, but he could never resist a crisis. Besides, Picard, the man who interrupted his idyllic memory, is the captain of the _Enterprise._ Not _his Enterprise,_ but a ship of the same name, eighty years removed from the _Enterprise-B._ And right now, he needs help stopping a madman from destroying an entire star-system to get back to the Nexus.

The second they exit that place, he reaches out to Spock, unsure if he even can after all this time, or if Spock would want him to. As he and Picard discuss strategy, he hears it.

_Jim?_

He continues talking to Picard, but carries on a second, telepathic conversation, balancing the two with practiced ease. He explains what happened as best he can to Spock. He catches the scent of _theris kov-sayas_ again _._

 _Having breakfast?_ he asks. _Save some for me. I’ll talk to you soon._

With that, he turns his focus to their current situation, and he and Picard charge into battle.

 

The bridge collapsed. He’s trapped underneath it. It’s bad. He can’t determine exactly _how_ bad, but there’s not much pain, not much feeling at all. Never a good sign. He coughs, and blood spills from his mouth, down onto his shirt.

He calls out to Spock, careful to keep how dire the situation is hidden from him. It’s difficult, but not impossible, and Spock had done the same for him, years ago.

_I’ve missed a lot. Can you catch me up?_

As Picard finds him in the wreckage, his mind floods with words and images.

 

“Did we do it?” he asks Picard, still focused on what Spock is showing him. “Did we...make a difference?”

 

Saavik, working in the Vulcan fleet. Her husband and their children. Valeris, fully rehabilitated, caring for Demora in her old age.

 

“Oh, yes,” says Picard. “We made a difference. Thank you.”

 

Their son, born after Jim was caught in the Nexus. Spock named him Soval, “from the honored, beloved one”. He’s the spitting image of Jim, but dark-eyed and serious-faced, every bit a Vulcan in his bearing. He was raised on Vulcan by Sarek, and betrothed to a Vulcan girl. His wedding on the family’s land -- Oddly enough, a young Picard was in attendance.

 

“Least I could do...for the captain of the _Enterprise._ ”

 

The lives and legacies of the old crew, now long dead, and Spock’s own life in the years since -- sometimes painful, but always meaningful.

 

“It was...fun,” he says to Picard. He can tell he doesn’t have long, can feel his grip on the world slipping. He wants to make it clear that he had no regrets.

 

_Go to the mirror. Let me see you._

His hair is greying, his face deeply lined, but his eyes are the same as ever -- deep and beautiful. There’s a delicate chain around his neck, and on it, two tarnished gold bands. Their wedding rings. He’s so very lovely.

Jim can’t hide what’s happening from him anymore. Their connection is fading in and out as the inevitable creeps closer.

The cup in Spock’s hand shatters in his grip, streaking his palm with olive blood.

“Oh, my…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Language note: sa-mi - informal of "sa-mehk", constructed from "ko-mehk" (mother) - a term for the father who carries a child.
> 
> And...oh my god, I'm finally done with this beast. Give me a week to rest and watch the AOS movies over again to reset my tone and we'll be back to the main story.
> 
> The remaining chapters will be titled:  
> 9\. Singularity  
> 10\. Trajectory  
> 11\. Causality  
> 12\. Unification
> 
> Depending on how one particular subplot plays out, there may be an additional chapter between "Trajectory" and "Causality". As of right now, I don't have an additional chapter in my outline, but if I feel like I can't resolve the subplot in a typical 2-4k chapter, there will be one more chapter in there before the end of the story.


End file.
